The Other Side
by I-am-LMR
Summary: A funny murder mystery with a cheesy romantic subplot. BA 'shippy. K plus for Murder She Wrote level violence and some mild language. Mystery, Humor, Romance
1. The Part that Comes Before the Credits

**The Other Side**

**by LMR**

Summary: My first casefile! Hey, where are you going? A funny murder mystery with a cheesy romantic subplot. What more could you ask for? Okay so, _a lot _more, but that's what you're getting, goshdarnit! BA 'shippy. "Murder She Wrote" level violence and some mild language. Mystery, Humor, Romance

Okay, so I originally wrote this with minimal, subtle 'ship stuff like you'd see on the show. Well, I _tried _to keep them behaved, but they kept flirting, and staring and they just wouldn't listen to me so it kind of turned into a romance.

Also, they held me at gunpoint and made me work in one of those scenes where they go undercover as a couple.

And then another one.

I tried to stop them. Honest.

**Chapter 1: The Part that Comes Before the Credits**

**xXx**

In New York City's War on Crime the worst criminal offenders are pursued by the detectives of the Major Case Squad. These are their stories. **Doink, doink**.

It was only the second, and the month was already looking lousy.

"You think I'm _clueless_? I know your schedule. You're there right now, you always are." A pause. "No," the woman snapped into her cell, impatiently running her hand through her almost non-existently short brown hair. _"You _don't understand. I have the evidence right here," she slammed her hand down on a portfolio on her kitchen table. "And believe me, I will _not _hesitate to tell everyone. And then, everything that you've worked for, gone. Think about that. But don't think too long. I'll be there in half an hour." She hung up angrily, stashed the paperwork in her back and slung it over her shoulder, then checked her phone one last time. 10:30. She had to be at the office by 11:00 a.m. She stashed the damning paperwork in her bag, and headed out the door, wondering if the rest of stinkin' April was going to be this stinkin' miserable.

This was a woman who was determined. This was a woman who was confident. This was a woman who was too stupid to realize that it is absolutely suicidal to blackmail somebody in the opening scene of a crime drama. I mean, come _on_, lady: You might as well wear a red shirt on _Star Trek_! You would go to the basement during a power outage to find the cat, wouldn't you?

Guess who's body is going to get discovered in 5...4...3...2...

xXx 

Winston Weaselman and his business associate, Zed "Z" Klutz, had been having trouble with their blood pressure lately and had decided to start jogging early every morning before work. It relaxed them, gave them a way to argue about who was more macho (read as "slightly less likely to collapse after ten yards"), and more importantly, it gave them a chance to debate and discuss deep intellectual and philosophical insights.

"No, really, Zee." Winston said, "I'm telling you: The fact is that a factiod _isn't _a little fact, it's something that _isn't _a fact that everyone passes off as a fact until everyone believes that it _is_, in fact, a fact."

Zed looked puzzled for just a moment, then seemed to understand. "So you're saying that the fact that a factoid is a fact is, in fact, a factoid?"

"Yes!" Weaselman said excitedly, happy that his companion had grasped the point. "But the really important thing to remember is th..." his voice trailed off and his face turned the color of bad cheese. "Oh my God," he whispered. He pulled out his cellphone and dialed 911. "I can't look," he said, staring.

His companion followed his eyes to the young woman collapsed next to the sidewalk, clearly dead and surrounded by blood.

Doink, doink, doo-doo-doo-doo-doo! Doink, doink, doo-doo-doo-doooo-doo!

**xXx**

Please read and review!


	2. Ooh, Yucky Dead Stuff to Poke At!

**The Other Side**

**by LMR**

Reviewers: You make my day!

A.N.: This chappie is a little more serious than the rest of the story, and has some mild gore. Sorry, but I had a hard time making jokes about the crime scene. Eames, fortunately doesn't have that problem.

Disclaimer: This stuff is not really mine. It's Vincent's and Kathryn's and Dick's. I couldn't have done it without them.

So blame them.

**Chapter 2: Oooh, Yucky Dead Stuff to Poke at!**

**xXx**

The victim, a woman in her early twenties, was pretty. She had a lovely, classical face that looked feminine even under the crewcut and behind the blood. The fatal wound was a slit across her throat, and her blue velour sweats were drenched her blood. The force of her heartbeat had sent it spraying all over the pavement in an arc like a sad rainbow. Her face showed no pain. It looked restful.

Naturally, Goren loved her immediately. He knew then that they _had _to catch her killer and bring him or her to justice. Eames saw the empathy on his face and shot him a bolstering but scolding glance. Yes, they would solve it, but stop thinking about her.

Eames gingerly picked up a bloody knife from the side of the blood pool, bagged it. The pool was marked as the site of the attack, while the victim had managed to get a few feet before collapsing.

Goren groped around the gym bag lying beside the pool. "No wallet or ID."

"Well that would take all the fun out of it," Eames remarked flatly. He smiled a little despite the grisly scene before them. "I've talked to the guys who found the body and shown the picture to everyone on the premises. Nobody recognizes her. Got a list of neighbors and regular guests who aren't here now. We're going to have some legwork checking on all of them."

"Weasleman and Klutz don't know anything?" Goren wondered as he rolled the woman's head a little to look at the bruise on her neck.

"Don't tempt me. But no, they don't know the victim. They've been told to stay in town.

"Meanwhile, the head security guard has come out registering his disgust, etcetera. Trying to alleviate guilt that it happened in his own backyard on his watch." She paused thoughtfully. "He's pro-war, isn't he? Apparently it's only okay to slaughter innocent civilians in other countries, and by the tens of thousands instead of one at a time."

Goren nodded agreement. "At least this killer didn't bother trying to fool people into thinking it was the right thing to do: He hid his identity instead of bragging about it.

"I guess we'll see later if _this _murderer claims Jesus told him to do it."

He rooted around the bag some more, fishing out a small orange pill bottle with frayed bits of paper stuck to the outside. "Label's ripped off. Probably an old one she uses for spares." He opened it carefully, tumbling the pills gently into a gloved palm. A big light blue one with black writing, and a shorter, squat little white one. "Depakote ER and Neurontin," he mumbled, knowing the pills by sight.

His partner's brow furrowed in thought. "Bipolar disorder, maybe?"

"Um, well, it could be," Goren said, momentarily dazed. He shook his head lightly, then turned over the woman's left arm. The other arm. "There's no scarring from cutting or suicide attempts. Not conclusive of course, but it could also be epilepsy."

"Well, best case scenario, those are legal. If that's the case, and she's got those pills, I'm betting she's got insurance," Eames surmised. "We can pull medical records from the bits of the label still on there. If they're illegal..."

"Then we have no idea," He finished, feeling around the top of her head, under her dark crewcut. "Hmm," he informed his partner. She squatted down beside him and looked at the part of the head he was examining. She saw the scar immediately and knew what he was thinking. "I don't think these are recreational. She needs them. There's been brain surgery."

"I guess Logan owes me five dollars." Goren looked at her for an explanation. "I _told _him you'd understand brain surgery. So do I need to drag you away from the victim before you decide it would be fun to pull her brain right out on the sidewalk and dissect it with that switchblade?"

"Well, I couldn't do _that_," he insisted as she rolled her eyes. _No kidding._

"It's not supported properly by its membrane at this angle," Goren continued, completely serious. "It would just kind of ooze out. The brain is the consistency of raw egg whites, you know," he concluded calmly, poking around her ears.

"No. I did _not _know," Eames told him. "And if you drop one more nifty bit of information like that, I'm going to end up contaminating the crime scene with my _breakfast_, and I am going to start with your shoes."

Goren smiled, distracted. "Besides, it's already been dissected. That scar, right there, loops all the way around the top of the head, kind of a 'C.' You can feel where a portion of the scull's been taken off and put back on."

"I'd rather not," she said, poking around at it anyway. "Ouch. Don't tell me they did a lobotomy on her?"

He was looking at the ground, still prodding the victim's head with a gloved hand. "They don't do those any more."

"Didn't work, huh?" Eames asked, moving around to the side of the curled up victim, examining the bruising around her neck, upstaged by the huge slit, the only cut on her.

"No, it killed them. Not physically, but the frontal lobe is where the personality is. They slice that up, that individual ceases to exist. It's akin to stealing their soul. It leaves a person an empty shell."

Eames's brow furrowed with concern, sensing she'd hit a sore subject. _Nice, Alex, I'm sure he really wants to start thinking about the ways they used to torture the mentally ill. _She swallowed."I shouldn't h-"

"Besides, they went in through the eye," he continued matter of factly as if she hadn't said anything more. "With a kind of an icepick thing." He gestured with his finger over his eyeball.

"Remind me never to invite you to a dinner party," she answered, relieved. "What kind of surgery do you think this was?" She nodded to the head.

"Could have been to sever the _corpus callosum_. Especially if she had epilepsy."

"The _corpus callosum_?" She wondered. He opened his mouth to explain, but was cut off. "But why would they want to separate the hemispheres on purpose? That would make their perceptions screwy, wouldn't it?"

"Hm? It could be worth it. A seizure is electrical activity. The further it travels the more damage it can do, so they-"

"They block off the main road, makes sense," she said, understanding.

"Right. It confines the damage." He gestured with his hands as if he were actually holding a brain, completely absorbed in the thought of it. He could practically envision the neurons firing. "Has to be pretty severe to be worth it, though. We need to get a list of neurosurgery clinics that would do this kind of procedure. There can't have been too many of those in the past..." he frowned, gesturing toward the hair, recently cut. "Two months, tops."

"Well, fascinating as all that is, I'd like to focus on the surgery someone did on her _neck _first." Eames gestured, folding back the neckline of her jogging suit to reveal the handprint, tracing the imprint of the thumb up to her chin. "The bruising is from attempted strangulation with a hand, before he went at her with the knife. Only one hand for the strangulation, looks like a right. Definitely the slit that killed her."

"Choking _and _jugular? That's overkill. I mean, If they had the knife, why bother?" He walked back to the blood pool, concentrating on the place that the knife had been. "The killer threw the knife down immediately after the kill. That and the fact that he had already made the bruising..."

"Not a professional," Eames finished. "The cut wasn't done with precision. This is somebody who knew that knife plus neck equals 'ow.'"

Goren nodded. He gestured to one of the CSU. "This guy's green. Check the trash can and bushes for vomit." He frowned down at the scene.

"You said the right hand?" She nodded. They stood over the puddle and the numbered tag that marked exactly where the weapon had been. "The killer's right hand did the choking, but the knife was found on the right side of this pool of blood - right from where we're standing, where the killer was most likely standing - in front of the victim. So the knife was most likely in his right hand for him to have dropped it here.

"He _might _have unsheathed it after trying to choke her," Eames thought out loud, "But that wouldn't make a lot of sense. Besides, if there was a matching sheath with the weapon, he would've taken it with him: He didn't care about this thing. It looks like any old utility knife to me, you can find it in any hardware store. And I don't think he carried it in his pocket. Maybe he choked her _after _he dropped it?" Eames offered, not really believing it.

Goren frowned. "Five minutes to bleed out, tops. The cut would have killed her before there was time to bruise. No smearing in the handprint, either. The slit was second."

"Perp choked her, she got away from him, and got this far before he caught up to her and this time he thought to bring a knife?" she threw out.

"In which case, he would have come up to her from behind." Goren pantomimed slicing a neck from behind with his right hand.

"So why was the knife on his left side if he was right-handed?" Eames finished the thought. "Two perps?"

"Or an unrelated bruise," Goren offered. "Maybe a history of abuse."

"There's no bile anywhere," the CSU officer reported. Eames nodded acknowledgement. "Looks like we got some fingernail scrapings from our girl, though," she told them. "Looks like she really ripped her killer. I'll send them right up to the lab."

"Priority," Eames told her.

"Eames." She went to where her partner was squatting over the woman's tennis shoes. He picked a small white rock out of the tread with tweezers.

"Lava rock," she assessed.

"I have a friend in the Burrows Apartment complex. They use this kind of rock in their walkways. It's not very common for landscaping around here." He dropped it neatly into an evidence baggie.

"Goody, field trip. So do I win the five dollars I bet Logan that you know all about rocket science?" she ventured.

He couldn't help but smile.

**xXx**

Sorry for the tedious crime detail. The rest of it will be lighter, I promise.

Theories? Ideas? Suggestions?


	3. The Stiff Gets a Name

**The Other Side**

**by LMR**

Disclaimer: If a person can't be convicted of murder because of insanity, it follows then that I cannot be convicted of stealing the ownership of CI. I can honestly say that I don't know what I'm doing.

Thank you so much for the reviews. They keep me updating.

**Chapter 3: The Stiff Gets a Name**

**xXx**

Main Office - The Burrows Apartment Complex - 6:13 a.m. **Doink, doink**.

The keyboard tapped judiciously.

Dear Diphead,

Thank you for the flowers. The trash needed some sprucing up. Oh, and no, you are not forgiven, by the way, and you are quite lucky I refrained from handling things the Carrie Underwood way. Long walk off short cliff now, please.

Your vastly superior ex,

Stacey

Stacey, the early morning clerk at the Burrows apartment complex, was in the middle of reasoning with her computer's vocabulary, read: _Stupid spellcheck! Of course "diphead" is a word you stone-age piece of_- when she was interrupted by the presence of two people whose juxtaposition managed to be comical despite the serious looks on their faces. She saw the badges and panicked. _Did I forget to clean up after Poopsie again?_

The detectives took in the room. It was an intriguing combination of mellow African décor with bright, harsh Asian style. It seemed contrived, and they got the sense that it wasn't a complex for the well-off. Getting to the girl's money was probably not a motive here. "I'm Detective Eames, this is Detective Goren. We're looking for information on someone who we think might have been a resident here." She showed the desk clerk a Polaroid of the victim, already laid out on the slab.

The clerk winced. "Oh, God." She was visibly flustered and uncomfortable.

"Take your time," Eames advised.

Stacey nodded, trying not to look at the picture. "That's Morris: 12A. Persephone Morris." She started fumbling though a file cabinet, pulled out a sheaf of papers. "What happened?"

"We're not sure yet," Goren said. "But we will find out. Were you friends?"

The clerk shook her head. "All I know is her name and paperwork. She always seemed pretty nice." Stacey shrugged, searching her brain for more about Persephone. "She paid her rent on time," she offered lamely, straightening her skirt, attempting to look composed.

"We'll need to see her apartment," Eames said gently.

xXx

After shuffling their way through plenty of red tape, Goren and Eames filed into the apartment, a small forensic crew in tow. There was barely room for all of them. The place was average, if a little on the messy side. Persephone's taste seemed to teeter on the line of expensive, yet tacky. Eames zeroed in on the orange prescription bottles on the table. "Dr. J. Jackson," she reported, bagging the bottles.

Goren nodded, shuffling through some books he'd found on a bedside table. _The Joy of Brussel Sprouts_, _But What Was the Cat _Doing _in the Bag?, _and _101 Uses for Tofu_.

"Eames," Goren lifted a book from where it was sitting beside _Boogers are Biodegradable and Other Useless Observations_. "Stack of books on epilepsy, split brain surgery. Looks like I found her hobby, too," he offered, holding up a cookbook. "_Mete_ (that's dinner)_ with Chaucer _and _Recreating Foodstuff's of the Fourteenth Century and a Few Years After That, Too_."

"That sounds like a hobby only slightly more edible than collecting stamps."

Goren shrugged, smiling. "Here's her work papers. She worked at the Wa..." _Yikes, what were they thinking?! _"Well, at a candy factory," he finished simply, hoping she wouldn't notice the omission.

She acknowledged him, then shifted her attention back to the table and counters. "Besides something labeled blankmangerand before you tell me, be advised that I_ really _don't want to know, the only thing in here is a bunch of diet food. The scale's right out in the kitchen. Obsessed with her weight?"

"She was about average size," Goren noted, looking at the papers on her desk.

Eames nodded, poking around the closet. "These are eights. She looked about a ten, twelve maybe. Recent weight gain, then. How long ago did she start those pills?" she asked herself, reaching for the paperwork that went with the prescriptions.

Goren's eyebrows knotted a bit, but before he could ask, Eames had gotten distracted by something in the closet. She pulled a paper grocery bag off the floor with a gloved hand. She opened it carefully. "Hey, Bobby, I found something." She pulled out a pink silk camisole. "Lingerie. Expensive stuff, too. Hm. A brown paper bag is how you keep clothes for rape evidence," she said, brow furrowed. "The temp ME hasn't finished a report, but the initial exam didn't look like there was any abuse or trauma other than the obvious. With these clothes... it's not likely rape evidence. Maybe she was blackmailing a cheating husband?" Goren nodded. It sounded likely enough. She gestured for a bigger evidence bag. He passed it, and she carefully put the lingerie into it for DNA testing.

"Where did she work, again?" Eames asked, now examining a large jade dragon sitting on a snap-together plastic table.

"A candy manufacturing plant." (No chance he was going to incur Eames's wit by saying the entire name of the place.)

"Assembly line stuff. How was she affording these things?" She gestured to the big screen TV and stereo system.

"I'm guessing her source of income is recent, as in after she signed her lease the last time." Goren said this while picking at a piece of loose plaster under the window.

Eames nodded. "Beautiful things in a trashy place. Recent acquisitions. Back to blackmail."

"Rich boyfriend?" Goren pointed out the hypothetical.

Eames shook her head. "First thing a girl gets from the rich boyfriend is jewelry: Jewelry boxes here are filled with nick-knacks, pushpins, paperclips. Nary a bling in sight," she reported. Goren, for all the empathetic skill he had, was slightly clueless with what he called "girl things."

Goren had wandered back to the sleeping area of the studio. "Address book," he said, gesturing for the photographer to take a shot of it before he picked it up carefully by the spine. "Not many names in here," he mumbled. He looked it over. "Dr. Jason Jackson."

"Okay, but I found him first," Eames reminded him over her shoulder.

"A neurosurgeon, too, Dr. Notusuf Kumupwitanahme." He kept flipping through the pages. "Here, this entry might have been a boyfriend." Eames took a look at it. The name 'Lennan A.' was written in the book. "Hmm. Gaelic. Means 'conc..." he dropped off realizing that Eames probably couldn't care less. Next to the name was a little heart.

A little heart that had been fiercely exed out. "Let's have a little chat with this heartbreaker," she commented.

**xXx**

Next time:

"She smiled at the salesgirl, still restraining her ersatz husband, holding him tightly to her as if she feared he would bolt at any moment. Eames rolled her eyes. 'They're impossible, aren't they?'"

You know you wanna hit that nice little button down there!


	4. The Chapter These Jerks Made Me Write

**The Other Side**

**by LMR**

Disclaimer: Dick Wolf created the show, which I am very grateful for. And I am infinitely grateful to VDO and KE for these wonderful characters. I am also very grateful to these two for making me the undisputed champ of "7 Steps to Kevin Bacon" in my group of friends. I mean, you can get to _anybody _with two steps!

Thank you so much for your reviews!

A.N.: Revised from first posting to reveal Eames's wicked plot.

**Chapter 4: The Chapter These Jerks Forced Me To Write (the first one, anyway)**

**xXx**

11th Floor - One Police Plaza - 7:34 a.m. **Doink, doink.**

Eames silently cursed her partner for all his "interesting" brain talk. Somehow she couldn't shake the irrational fear she'd found rattling around in her head that her gray matter would start leaking right out her ears.

"Logan or Wheeler sick?" Goren wondered, looking at the other detectives' empty chairs.

"No. It's their week off. Logan filed for this week a few months ago," she raised an eyebrow and smiled. "I think he's told everyone he's seen right down to every cab driver in the city, Mr. Ever-observant yet clueless." He smiled at the insult. She rolled this thought over in her mind for a moment. "So for this week, we _are _Major Case Squad, huh? Nice." She tapped at her computer. "Only one Lennan A. in the city. Lennan Alman. No home number, I'm gonna call his work. He's an attendant at 'Edgar's Suits Shop' a few blocks from the Burrows. She looked at her partner, who seemed a little distracted. "Something wrong, Bobby?"

He shook it off. "Sorry, I got this weird bit of _déjà_ _vu_, no big deal."

She shrugged. Once in a while, there was no talking to him. He was temporarily disconnected at the moment. She'd try later. 

"Hello, this is Detective Eames with Major Case Squad, NYPD, and we need to locate one of your employees, Lennan Alman. No, he's a person of interest in a case. We need to- You don't know?" she repeated, disbelieving. "He just up and left? Well where are you sending his paychecks?" she tried to keep her voice friendly. "PO box, of _course_. Thank you," she finished, her tone completely without gratitude. She turned to her partner. "Loyal bastard. He knows. I can tell, and he's not telling the fuzz. Said his employees aren't going to talk to us, either. This is going to be fun." She paused, a somewhat evil smirk on her face. "You know, this place opens at seven..." She shot him a look. _Up for a game?_

xXx

Edgar's Suit Shop - 64 Groaner St. - 7:40 a.m. **Doink, doink.** (Yes, I do have to type it out every single time.)

Goren whined, "Oh, Hon, I don't need a nee-" Eames dragged him into the posh store by the arm.

"Oh, shush, you know you do." She smiled at the salesgirl, still restraining her ersatz husband, holding him tightly to her as if she feared he would bolt at any moment. "Hi, Miss Ash," she said sweetly, seeing the nametag. "My husband needs some new su- Yes, you do," she insisted under her breath to a sulking Goren. He was wearing casual clothes now - Not a chance his suits would pass for old and tattered. They headed for the counter, to the side of the front window.

If Miss Ash was any indication, they figured, Lennan had a good income. She was immaculately dressed, and even with an employee discount, her clothes were too nice to have come cheap. Her red hair was professionally cut and curled. A matching ruby ring and necklace made a case-closing argument that this was a well-off woman.

"Can't we just go buy you some new shoes or something? Wouldn't that get it our of your system?" he asked petulantly.

Eames rolled her eyes. "They're impossible, aren't they?" she appealed to the salesgirl, tapping her fingers on a sleek counter covered in tie racks. "You should see the ratty old things he wears." 

"But why did we have to come all the way out here?" he grumbled, trying to hang back from the counter. Eames dragged him back to her, putting on a stretched smile.

"Bonnie. told. me." She said this in the _I've told you this a hundred times, pay attention_ voice that only a woman can make. "That her husband got his suits here, and it was the best, most helpful place he'd been. She said it's worth the drive."

The salesgirl smiled politely. "Bonnie gave us a name," Eames said, turning her attention to the her. "Umm," she struggled with it, snapping her fingers and gesturing at her husband to help her think of it. "Something weird. Brennan?"

"Leonard," Goren offered.

"No, Bob, it didn't have a 'd,' I know that." Eames gave his arm a light smack. 

He threw his head back, feining frustration. "It was Leonard." 

"Memory's the first thing to go," she quipped. "Well, second, maybe," she amended, running a hand through the random gray spots that had, incidentally, started showing about the same time Nathan had started showing. She smiled disarmingly, daring him to call her on the taunt later.

"That'll be Lennan," the young woman said, enough displeasure in her voice to tell the detectives that the store ran on commission. _Act like we're going to buy a lot of stuff,_ Eames thought, _and she'll tell me anything._ "He's not here right now."

"Oh, that's a shame," Eames said, sounding sincere. "Maybe we should just come back later, when-"

"_Urrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrggh_." 

"Thank you for your input, Dear," she threw over her shoulder. "When will he be back? Tomorrow, maybe?" She formed her face into an expression of mixed disappointment and hope. 

"Not for a while," the girl said brusquely. "I'm sure I could help you and your husband with whatever you need." She gestured for Goren to follow her to the back of the store where she started looking through the big and tall racks. He detached himself from Eames and reluctantly headed for the racks. "Now with your shape, I would suggest-"

"Oh, I don't want help, I just- can't I just try them on? On my own?" He was being as annoyingly exasperating as possible.

"Just let her help you, Bob," Eames sighed, knowing full well that he would manage to irritate her right out of the dressing area in no time without her help.

"Ahh-lex, I don't want help! I just- Hey!" He pulled his arm sharply away from Linda, who'd been trying to roll up his sleeve to estimate the best cut for a dress shirt. _That's a good excuse, anyway_, the girl figured.

He gave Ash a wounded look that reminded her of a tomcat that had been whacked upside the head by a kitten. "I'll do it myself," he whined.

Miss Linda Ash ran her fingers through her red hair, her ring flashing under the bright lights, the rest of her shrinking under the evil death-glare of Bob the Annoying-as-Heck-Yuppie-Scuz. "Fine with me," she said with a strained smile. "And if you need any spring outfits, the light colored pants and the, um, short-sleeved dress shirts are over there." She pointed toward the display at the front of the store.

"Sorry about him, Miss," Eames intoned once Goren had started fumbling around with the suits. "You got one of those?" she wondered conversationally.

"Not yet, and you can call me Linda."

"Huh. Bonnie, my friend, she's kind of a gossip. She told me that Lennie seemed to be _pretty _interested in one of the girls here..." she smiled mischievously and gestured toward the salesgirl. "You?"

"No," the girl said plainly.

"Well, she also said he mentioned a girlfriend. Men." She looked at the woman appraisingly. "You look tired." She glanced back at Bobby, wearing a nice dress shirt and jacket. "Oh, no, Hon, that's no good at all. Try one of those," she gestured absently toward the front window, at the outfits the girl had indicated for spring wear. Back to Linda. "Have you been working extra?" she asked sympathetically. The girl nodded noncommittally. "That's bad for your health, you know. When I worked in a clothing store, they ran me ragged. There was this punk who never bothered to show up, and I got stuck with all his shifts."

The woman sighed with familiarity. "Yes! It is so agg-" She suddenly looked guilty. "Sorry, I shouldn't vent on our guests."

"Oh, hon, I worked retail, too. I hear ya'. The snobs that come in." She shook her head wearily. "Bob's... I'm sorry. He's really not a snob, he comes across kind of... well he's an ac-"

"What about this one?" Goren called, this time in a long-sleeved but somewhat lighter shirt.

"Better," she said, giving him an appraising look. "But remember the weather's getting warmer now," she pointed out, gesturing toward a different rack. She turned her attention back to Linda as Goren fumbled through the short-sleeved shirts Eames had indicated. "Bennie's shifts, huh?"

Linda looked hesitant, but nodded. "Man, if I were you," Eames advised, "I would find out where he got to and knock him senseless."

Linda just shrugged. "No idea where he is."

Eames laughed unfunnily. "Might be living in a cardboard box. I mean, if he just up and left his job..."

"He doesn't need this job. Parents are filthy stinkin' rich. And so self-absorbed. I mean, they just bought a second home. Good grief, there are people who don't have _one_, how can a person be so selfish, anyway?" Linda suddenly looked self-conscious, stared down at the dull beige carpeting. "Sorry about the soap box."

Eames gestured openly. "No worries, I completely agree. Where on earth would a person live for just a season, anyway?" she tossed off, examining a tie clip on the rack in front of her.

"Mostly islands, I guess. Their's is in Amityville, though. Snob city."

"Huh. You about done, Bob?" she called.

"Yup. How do I look?" Goren asked from across the room. He was wearing a short-sleeved dress shirt that had to have been a size too small and a pair of dark gray dress pants that were about three sizes too big around the middle, but were far too short. Black and white wingtips completed the outfit, along with bright green suspenders and a blue and purple polka dot tie.

Trying not to laugh, Eames looked him over. "You really don't want to know what I'm thinking," she said honestly. _You'd turn fifteen shades of red._

He grinned, then picked up a regular and rather nice-looking dress shirt from where it had been hanging in the changing room. "I'll take this," he told Linda in his normal voice.

Eames's jaw dropped. _What the?!_

"Well, I was such a jerk, I should by _something_ from her," he pointed out quietly. "What, it's a nice shirt." He set the items on the counter with his card, gave Linda a charming smile, then headed back for the changing room.

Linda was rattled by the change. "He's very...um..."

"Yeah, I'd say 'um' sums it up. Thanks for your help...well, for trying to help, anyway," she was sure to add.

**xXx**

Next time:

"'And you see that, right there, that little mark. It looks to me like a little heart... that somebody tried to _slaughter_. Now that tells me this breakup wasn't so peaceful.'"

You guys write great reviews! Keep it up!


	5. Heads They Aren't Trying to Play With

**The Other Side**

**by LMR**

Disclaimer: LMR doesn't own Criminal Intent. I've been saving up, though...

A.N.: Thank you thank you thank you for your reviews. FYI, I revised chapter 4.

**Chapter 5: Heads They Aren't Trying to Play With**

**xXx**

11th Floor - One Police Plaza - 8:45 a.m.** Doink, doink.**

"I'm Detective Eames. If you'll just have a seat here, Mr. Alman. My partner will be joining us shortly." She led the young man into the windowed room that they used for people whose heads they weren't trying to play with... much.

"Am I a suspect?" The young man fidgeted in the uncomfortable chair, running a hand through his short hair, nervous.

"You're just a person of interest," Eames answered, paying little attention to him as she shuffled the paperwork. "We want to find out what you know about the situation. We're not holding you here." She eyed him. "Should you be a suspect?" she added coolly, taking a seat and opening their file.

Lennan was a handsome young man with short black hair and deep brown eyes. To his credit, those eyes were red today. He was dressed like a punk rocker, ripped blue jeans and a bulky hoodie that declared to the world that he was with stupid. His oversized tennis shoes were untied, and Eames momentarily feared she'd have to restrain Bobby from "helping" with them.

They'd seen Alman through the window before they went in to apprehend him. He'd been sitting on the living room floor, drinking soda and chewing aspirin, the TV on in the corner. He glanced up at "The A-Team" occasionally, but obviously didn't care too much if a plan came together or not. He looked like he didn't care much about anything at the moment.

He'd been upset when they'd given him the news, and acted resigned but not terribly surprised when they announced that they were taking him in for questioning.

"I didn't kill anyone," he insisted now. "I still care about 'Sephone. It was a peaceful breakup."

Goren bumbled into the room, holding two soda cans. "Sorry about that," he mumbled. "Um, I got an extra by accident." He offered it to Eames, who waved it off. "Lennan?"

"No thanks," he said. "I'm not thirsty." He smiled just a little. "But I'd be perfectly happy to give you my fingerprints. I want you to catch the guy that did this. I never wanted Persephone to get hurt."

Goren gave a 'you made me' smile, shrugged and settled backwards into a chair, resting his chin on his fist and watching Lennan with interest. The trick worked either way it played out. Either they got free prints, or the perp thought he was smarter than they were. Goren loved it when they thought they were smarter than Eames and he. Made it more fun.

"Yeah, Goren, he was just telling me about his friendly break-up," she said, with a slightly mocking tone. "Do you know how we found your name, Lennan?" He shrugged, indifferent. She took an evidence bag out of the file and turned it so the writing on the page was facing him. "This is a page in the address book we found in Persephone's apartment. See your name there?" She tapped her finger on it. "And you see that, right there, that little mark. It looks to me like a little heart... that somebody tried to _slaughter_. Now that tells me this wasn't so peaceful. When you and the dead girl are giving us two different versions of your breakup, guess who we're going to believe." Lennan winced at her cold reference to Persephone, a detail that didn't go unnoticed by either detective.

"She was mad at me for a while, yeah. She got sick of my calling her, begging really," he admitted dejectedly. "I just mean that there was no real fighting or anything. There was no cheating, neither one of us was being a jerk, she just... wasn't sure, that's all. She got a little annoyed with me after: I called a couple times, it probably pissed her off. But she never did anything that would make me..." He rubbed his eyes and jostled his knee, uncomfortable.

"So, you had nothing to do with her death, yet just before she was killed, you up and left your job, hid out at your parents' summer house without telling anyone where you were going. What was it you were telling me about 'actions of a guilty mind' yesterday, Goren?"

Lennan looked reluctant to talk, then apparently decided it was better to spill out his real guilt than fall into the guilt they were suspecting. "I have a drinking problem. I've been sober for seven months... until 'Sephone left me. I had a relapse. I had to skip out."

_Drinking problem. Skip out. _Eames looked tentatively at Goren. _So much for Bobby the Good Cop. _She was going to have to switch places. And fast. "You knew you needed some time, so you retreated for a while, to get yourself together, just temporary, before you got back in the game. I can buy that. It would be the _responsible _thing to do." She put emphasis on the word, shifting her eyes to see if her partner was keeping his cool. _Please don't freak out on me, Bobby._ "Your boss know about this? That why he wouldn't talk to us?"

He nodded, head down. "They understand. It's a family run business. They're good people. They wanted to do what they could to help me."

"Your parents' place was clean," she pointed out, causing Lennan to look hopeful. "You've been doing well the past couple weeks, haven't you? The aspirin for withdrawal symptoms. The soda for a behavioral replacement." He nodded.

"Um," Goren started. "When was the breakup?" Something had momentarily shaken him, but he at least seemed calm. Eames read him carefully. Real calm. He'd understood her point.

"Two weeks ago. I haven't talked to her since. I tried to call her, get her to talk to me. She never answered, never returned my calls. We were together five months," he sighed. "Doesn't sound like much, I guess, but we were good together. I would never hurt her," he insisted again.

"We'll need a list of your activities, where you were, and who was with you all day yesterday and today." She pushed a legal pad and pen across the table to him.

"I can save you the trouble," he growled in annoyance. "I wasn't with anybody. I was alone the whole day and I fell asleep at nineish, slept through to ten this morning. Perfect, huh?" he ended sourly. "Wait, no, I had to go to the hardware store yesterday afternoon. The toilet was actin' screwy."

They exchanged a glance._ Oh, interesting. _"How did you pay?"

"Credit," he answered, and it looked to Eames like he was wondering if it would look better or worse for him than cash. 

Eames nodded. "You do realize your moving closer and closer to the 'suspect' category right?" She looked to her partner as if hoping for confirmation. Goren shrugged, acting as if this information was inconsequential. Lennan looked between the two of them, obviously not sure which was more likely to believe him.

"What do you know about this?" Eames shoved a close-up of her neck under his nose.

He inhaled harshly. "God, I- I never saw that." He let out a low moan. "I don't know."

"You never saw this?" Lennan understood the subtext. _You never _did _this? _

"No, I didn't. I don't know what else to say. I didn't do this." Goren looked at Eames and she could tell he believed him. Nothing more they could do now, anyway.

She nodded. "Thank you. Stay in town, we'll want to talk to you again. The assisting officer will get your prints. You can go now, Lennan." _And why didn't Bobby ever tell me what that name meant? I want the useless geeky stuff!_

xXx

Eames hung up Persephone's cellphone; passed it to Goren. "The messages Lennan left weren't angry. He didn't have a grudge," she explained to a hovering Ross. "They were sad, pitiful really, and angry with himself. He never projected that anger outward." She sighed. "Gut feeling: This isn't our guy."

"Keep him on the suspects list," Ross advised, headed back to his office.

Eames scowled. _What, we're just going to forget him?! We're weirdos, not idiots! _Goren shrugged, while Eames reached to catch her phone. He watched his partner's face as she listened. She was apparently not happy with the information.

"Thanks, John." Eames hung up. "John stayed up in Amityville after our bust?" She got a nod of confirmation that he remembered. "He's been poking around the parents' house and the local store. 

"Hardware store clerk can't remember Lennan, no idea what he bought. Receipt only has prices, not items; knife costs the same as a lot of other things, including toilet parts. Our guy checked out the toilet, and it _has _been worked on recently. He might have bought a knife, but there's no way to tell.

"Next stop, workplace." she continued. "Where did she work?"

"She was the Head Sprinkle Quality Inspector at, um, well, The Wa...um, it's a candy fact- um, here." Eames accepted the file that he offered, a quizzical look on her face. Her eyes widened as she saw the name of the place.

"No wonder you didn't want to say it out loud. Were the people that started this place snorting their Pixie Stix?"

Going to a candy factory. A brief view of the nerf-gun incident flashed through Eames's mind, and she rolled her eyes just knowing that Bobby in a candy factory was going to be somewhere between a nightmare of the worst kind and the most entertaining thing she'd ever seen.

He did not disappoint.

**xXx**

Next time:

Well, I think that last line was trailer enough, huh?

\/


	6. Kid in a Candy Story

**The Other Side**

**by LMR**

Thank you so much for your reviews. They inspire me to make the story better.

Disclaimer: I don't own the show. Unfortunately, I _do _own the Wa...um. Well, the, er... The candy factory.

**Chapter 6: Kid in a Candy Store **

The Wacky Happy Fluffy Bunny Candy manufacturing plant - 9:12 a.m. **Doink, doink**.

The sign was bubblegum pink with purple polka dots. _Not really the colors one would associate with food, normally_, Goren mused. And somehow, it was the least hideous thing on the building. The entire thing looked like an overdone gingerbread house designed by a wayward troop of rather dysfunctional monkeys.

"I think I gained ten pounds just _looking _at this building," Eames remarked.

Goren knew in his gut that this was one of those jokes it was best not to respond to. Eames wasn't one of those women who threw out comments to bait any man unfortunate enough to be in a twelve mile radius. She'd never done anything like that before. But looking at it as a cost/benefits analysis, the risk was simply too great to bank on the probable reality.

_And applying economic principles to a joke is a sure sign of mental instability_, he reminded himself.

The inside of the factory was kinder, or rather it was comfortably harsh instead of sickeningly fluffy. It managed to look like any sensible factory, cold steel, solid concrete, assembly lines, sharp angles. Bobby grinned at a conveyor belt of jawbreakers and popped a pink one happily into his mouth.

They zeroed in on the woman who seemed to be in charge. Her long black hair was pulled into a ponytail, and she was rocking whimsically on the balls of her feet. Her dark eyes had an eager expression matched by her voice. "Welcome to the Wacky Happy Fluffy Bunny candy plant. How can I help you?" Despite the greeting, she was obviously trying very hard to look efficient and severe. The extent of her efforts extended to a blue clipboard and obviously fake glasses. They weren't working. She looked like someone whose personality fit the ill-named factory.

"Ha, Uhm Dut-

"Detectives Goren and Eames," she said quickly, nudging her partner out of the woman's direct line of sight. "We're with Major Case Squad. We wanted to ask you some questions about one of your employees, Persephone Morris? You are?"

"Kari Jeffries. Yeah, I know Persephone. I haven't seen her for about three weeks or so." She snapped her fingers, thinking. "She's been out with that...brain...thingie." She gazed at them suspiciously.

"Is she in trouble?" 

Eames and Goren exchanged a look. _This part sucks._

"I'm sorry, Kari. Persephone was found dead early this morning," Eames told her. "We think she was murdered."

Kari stifled a gasp. "Oh no. But you didn't say you were homicide detectives. You said Big Case...Thingie?"

"Major Case Squad," Goren corrected, having neatly slipped the jawbreaker into an evidence baggie for safekeeping. "For high profile cases." He tried to minimize this last bit of information; toss it off casually, not looking at her. She wasn't buying it. Her eyes widened, and the detectives could see she had every intention of wheedling them for as much information as she could get.

_Clueless and nosy. Great. _

"It's only because the location of the body got attention, that's all. Um, this brain thingie? Was Persephone getting disability for that?" 

"No, unfortunately she hasn't been here long enough. And Head Sprinkle Quality Inspector is considered pretty low in the poking order, you know? You can't really get benefits like that until you're up to the level of Glazing Moderation Supervisor."

Eames tried to contain a smirk. "Can you take us to her locker, wherever she kept her possessions?"

"We don't have lockers here at the Wacky Happy Fluffy Bunny plant. We feel they lead to a feeling of negativity that does not accurately..." she searched for the words. It was clear she was reciting the company handbook, and probably didn't have any idea what she was actually saying. She reached for the right words. "It reminds everyone of school.

"But I'll be happy to take you to her cubby hole."

Eames just nodded, not trusting herself to open her mouth.

Bobby shuffled through the papers in the cubby. "Psychology articles. Looks like they were printed out, probably from the university library. They don't let their academic journals leave the building," he explained.

"I'm sure you've tried."

"Not just epilepsy either. Looks like she took an interest in some different mental diseases, too. Depression, bipolar, borderline. Schizophrenia."

He read an underlined passage of a complicated neuropsych book. The word "Identical!" was scrawled next to it. Hm, it wasn't a monozygotic twin study, so what did that word mean here? Whatever it was, the writing looked like she was happy about it. He sensed triumph in the enthusiastic line under the word and the exclamation point. He passed the text to Eames.

She rifled through the pages. Without even realizing what she was doing, she leaned over and sniffed the paper. "There's kind of... something... smells good," she offered lamely. "I have no clue," she conceded.

She shoved the book up at his nose, consulting for a second opinion. "I have a cold," he admitted sheepishly.

"Not allowed," Eames grumbled, closing the book with more force than was entirely necessary. They finished and nodded for Kari to show them the production area where Persephone would have been every day. 

Upon seeing the vat of sprinkles, Bobby grinned stupidly. _Here we go_, Eames thought, forcing her attention on Kari. "Show us where she worked?"

"Right there," she pointed to an empty spot on the assembly line.

"Okay, when was the last time you spoke with Persephone?"

"Well, I-" Kari had just started talking when Goren snapped on a pair of rubber gloves. The noise stole her attention. "Detective, you can't touch that," she said insistently, with a note of panic in her voice.

"Good luck," Eames said, trying to sound annoyed. Kari gave her a look, and Eames shrugged. "Goren," she called. "You should probably stop that," she said in the same tone she used to tell her nephew that he really should refrain from flushing her best slippers down the toilet.

He looked up at her, eyebrow raised. _You mean that?_

She gave him a "what do you_ think_?" look. _Of course not. Commence distraction. _

He grumbled something, and stopped for approximately 5.7 seconds until she "wasn't looking," then resumed happily playing in the sprinkles. He first sorted them by color as best he could without tweezers. _Cool colors here, warm colors here, neutrals in the middle. Ooh, lookie, I can spell stuff!_

Once Kari was too flustered to spin any coherent lies, Eames got her talking about Persephone's work. She could see out of the corner of her eye that Bobby was moving over toward Persephone's spot on the assembly line and chatting up the person who would have stood next to her, a lovely tall woman who was, in Eames's opinion, not wearing nearly enough clothes as was appropriate for this particular conversation.

"So, hi, uh..." He ducked his head to look at the name woven onto her coveralls. "Abrynna, hi. I'm Bobby. I'm just visiting the plant today." He said, giving a charming smile. He looked around, then back at Abrynna's station. "So, what are you doin' with the sprinkles, there?"

"I'm running the size sorter," she said wearily, but happy to complain. She was looking very intently at a computer moniter that was showing, in stunningly realistic detail, the sprinkles on the belt two feet from her nose.

"And today," she added, exasperated. "I'm also doing the quality inspections because my supervisor apparently thinks that there's no reason we actually hire two people for these jobs instead of just one."

"Bummer. Somebody get laid off?"

"No. Morris, the inspector, is on medical leave."

"So this Morris guy... What's wrong with him?"

"_She _had brain surgery last month."

"No kidding. Wow. And she's still out for that?" He leaned casually against the machinery.

"Well, she didn't _want _to stay home. She needed the money. And she seemed to really _like _talking my ear off," she grumbled. "But they insisted. She kept messing things up, like she couldn't get coordinated."

"Hmm. Well, at least this way, with her on leave, I mean, she's not talking too much at you. What'd she like to talk about? She got a guy?"

"Not for a while. No, she's a real geek, that's the stuff she talks about. Always reading all this stuff nobody outside the realm of seriously messed up could even understand. Mostly brain stuff. Got interested since she has epilepsy?" Her tone was a cue for him to show he was paying attention. He nodded for her to continue. "So she keeps reading about it. Statistical anemones and stuff, I don't know."

He glanced back at Eames, who seemed slightly irritated about something. _Kari's not distracted enough_, he surmised, _and Eames can't interview her properly. I can fix that._

And fix Eames's problem he did, as he shifted his attention from Abrynna to the pipe over the conveyor belt. "Hey, this is neat," he said, distracted. "How does this work?" He determinedly lifted himself up onto the edge of the belt, careful to stay off the moving parts.

xXx

"I can't take you anywhere." The note of pride in Eames's voice was unmistakable. 

Goren had the decency to look moderately ashamed as they made their way back to the SUV. "Persephone was having coordination problems. That's typical of split-brain surgery patients."

"Got that from the Amazon?" she asked playfully.

"No, from Abrynna, she works next to her on the line," he answered, missing the snark completely. "She also said Persephone needed money, she didn't want to go off work without disability."

"We just need to find her supplemental source of income." Eames beeped the SUV, and swung herself up into the seat. "Sheesh, it's only 9:30. Why am I hungry already?" she asked under her breath.

Goren looked at her, brow furrowed, worried that she might be getting sick. The only time she'd ever gotten hungry at odd hours for no apparent reason was when she'd gotten a particularly bad flu. Well, that and when she... "You're not going away again are you?" he asked pitifully.

She was momentarily confused, then noticed he was examining her stomach. "You'll want to be very careful, Goren, about the next thing out of your mouth." she warned, putting the car in gear.

"No! You don't _look -_ I just meant, I don't know why else you would be hungry, that's all."

She shook her head, letting him off the hook for his assumption. "No clue. It's passing anyway."

"I mean, you _really _don't look, I just-"

She rolled her eyes; smiled just enough to let him know that first, she'd been joking, and second, she found his panic very amusing. "Think the ME has our results now?"

**xXx**

Next week: Um, that _was _the trailer: The ME has their results now.


	7. Nothing Conclusive

**The Other Side**

**by LMR**

Disclaimer: There was a fanficer from Norfolk, who really did like to press his luck. He did never disclaim, and when the cops came, all he could say was, "Oh, darn." That said, I don't own it.

**Chapter 7: Nothing Conclusive**

**xXx**

The Morgue - One Police Plaza - 10:30 a.m. **Doink, doink**.

Goren was not happy to find a different M.E. than he'd expected. This guy seemed like a kid, he was short, waifish, and didn't look like he'd be _nearly _as funny as Rodgers.

Goren didn't like him. "Where's Elizabeth?" he wondered, trying not to sound accusatory.

"Called in sick, last minute." The kid shrugged almost guiltily. "I'm Desmond. I'm still in training, but I think I can handle what we've got now for a couple days until she comes back. I hope."

"You'll do fine," Goren said politely, not believing it for a moment.

"What can you tell us about Morris?" Eames wanted to know.

"Well, she died..." He left a bit too long a pause here, until Eames could barely keep from making a quip about overstating the obvious. "I mean, of course she... what I mean is she died somewhere between midnight and four a.m. Monday, so she was found pretty soon after, not exactly hidden. Well, the slit is obviously what actually... um... did the, well it was what..."

The detectives could tell that Desmond was trying to be tactful - a habit that would wear off quickly.

"What did her in," Eames filled in unabashedly, starting to understand why Bobby had been all but praying for her to have a preemie. "And the choking?"

"Oh, that happened first," he said uselessly.

"We guessed that," Eames said, as politely as she could manage.

"We analyzed the fingernail scrapings," he said a bit too eagerly, glad to have something to tell them.

"Got anything?" Goren wondered.

"Yes, but nothing helpful." He suddenly seemed to realize that he wasn't going to get to feel smart after all because the results were ridiculous. "It's her _own _DNA," he reported in a mumble, feeling silly.

"But not the killer's DNA? Alman's?" Eames asked with waning hope of learning anything useful.

"No, Ma'am. And we know the killer must've worn gloves: There were no prints at the scene other than Morris's. Um, forensics found that, I mean. I didn't," he said, realizing that the only helpful thing in this dialog didn't get to come from him. _Why didn't I become a podiatrist? _Desmond wondered mournfully.

Eames huffed a bit. _Save us from inferior replacements. _She felt a light tap on her arm, and knew she was being told not to raise her blood pressure about it. _Like he can talk! _She gave a strained smile. "Thank you."

They left the morgue feeling that they hadn't learned a thing.

xXx

"All right, what do we know about these doctors?" Goren asked as they sat at their desks.

"Okay, Dr. Jackson," she consulted her paperwork. "Oh." She raised an eyebrow and seemed to perk up. "He did three years work for the city mandatory psychiatry for inmates and newly released prisoners."

"His DNA'll be in the system." Goren pointed out, feeling a little more optimistic than he'd been a moment ago.

She nodded. "Looks like his DNA has been all over the place: He was suspended indefinitely for 'inappropriate behavior' with three former inmates of Bayview Correctional. What about the neurosurgeon?" she gestured to the files on Goren's desk.

"Set up a private practice in '94. No record of any trouble with the law, nothing out of the ordinary."

Eames could see that Bobby was glancing up at her every few seconds. She gave it about a minute to work itself out. It didn't, and she could tell he wanted to say something. "What is it?" she asked, allowing a note of incredulity and concern to creep into her voice so she wouldn't sound accusatory.

"Um... Eames, well lately you've been saying things I wouldn't expect you to... well, I mean... Eames, have you been, um, reading about psychology? About mental illness, I mean?" He refused to look at her, tapped his pen against the paper he was looking at.

She returned her focus to her paperwork, barely glancing up at him, acting uninterested. "We're working a case with a brain surgery patient. I looked up a couple things."

No chance he was going to fall for that. "Before that," he reminded her, feeling a little bolder.

"I read up on a lot of things, Goren." The tone in her voice left no further room for discussion. He nodded. _Consider it dropped._

**xXx**

Reviews mean a lot to me. Thank you.


	8. It is Brain Surgery

**The Other Side**

**by LMR**

Disclaimer: For me to be Dick Wolf would take some painful surgery. I'll settle for stealing his characters with no profit to me whatsoever.

A.N.: A million thanks to Claire (guitar73girl) for Beta'ing. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

**Chapter 8: It **_**is **_**Brain Surgery**

**xXx**

The office of Dr. Notusuf Kumupwitanahme - 11:00 a.m. **Doink, doink**.

The calm room didn't look like a surgeon's office. The carpet was a soothing brown wave pattern, the walls were woody orange with pretty little pictures of flowers. The recliner in the middle looked like a dentist's chair, and the detectives could imagine that he might sit in his swivel office chair and hover around their heads. There were two eye charts, one on the wall and another on the ceiling. The other spaces were covered with color illustrations of brains, along with a beautiful mountain scene, probably to distract patients from thinking about the fact that Kumupwitanahme was going to be slicing into their gray matter (Which Eames sincerely hoped didn't happen here). Files were scattered all over the doctor's desk, and she wondered how he could find anything in the mess.

The doctor himself, however, was tidy, looking very businesslike in his white lab coat and stethoscope, which Eames sort of figured he wore just to look important.

"Doctor, uh..." Eames struggled with the pronunciation.

"Notusuf Kumupwitanahme," he said, somehow making the name sound very simple. "Most people in the states just call me 'Suf,' or 'Dr. Nahme.' How can I help you?"

"We're here about a patient," Eames said, noting that Bobby seemed to be having as much fun in a brain doctor's office as a candy factory. He was looking at the bright posters and 3-D models with enthusiasm bordering on the obscene. "Persephone Morris. We found your name in her documents. We think she'd had-"

Dr. Nahme nodded. "Split-brain surgery, I remember." His forehead crinkled. "Is something wrong?"

_What's wrong is this doctor's ethics of patient confidentiality_, Eames thought, somewhat grateful. Goren examined the doc's face as Eames told him, "We're sorry to have to tell you this, Doctor. Persephone died this morning. We're investigating her death as a homicide." Goren glanced at Eames. _He seems surprised._ She nodded. "When was the last time you saw her?"

"Her last appointment was..." he looked up at the ceiling. "Three weeks ago."

"And you haven't seen her during your off-hours?" This came from Goren, leaning right down near the doctor's face. It was the first thing he'd said, and it startled Dr. Nahme.

Either the insinuation was lost on the doctor or he was ignoring it. "No, I haven't seen her since the last time she was in for a post-op check-up." He ran a hand through his hair and shifted on the balls of his feet, impatient or worried, the detectives couldn't tell. "Look, I can't really help you: You know I can't release her medical records."

"Actually, Doc, we were hoping you could talk to us about anything else she told you. You know, bartender, hairdresser, brain surgeon," Eames said with a serious face.

He chuckled. "Well, in the O.R. she really wasn't feeling too talkative. The consultation and follow-ups here she just talked about the epilepsy. She was scared, naturally. Nobody likes their brain picked." He smiled, and they could tell he'd used that line a hundred times and never ceased to be pleased with his own cleverness.

"Was she having coordination problems after the procedure?" Goren wondered.

The doctor brightened, obviously impressed. "You did your homework, Detective." 

He waved his hand, physically dismissing the idea. "A woman at her work mentioned it. So she was?"

"The usual. She couldn't name objects by sight, but she could with tactile information. Her case was pretty minor, though. I've seen some patients trip all over themselves, their hands won't work together. Hers wasn't all that bad."

"Bad enough that the factory made her leave work without pay," Eames insisted. Doctor Kumupwitanahme winced. "Was she having trouble swinging her co-pay?"

He nodded in recognition. "At first. Then about two weeks after her procedure, she started pulling it just fine. Said she got a raise. Don't know how she managed that if she wasn't working."

"Not a clue," Eames intoned. 

Goren straightened, tearing his attention from a take-apart plastic brain that had just crumbled in his mock-bumbling hands. "One more thing: The last few times she was here, did she act nervous? On edge or paranoid, maybe?"

He shrugged. "Not that I noticed, but the post-ops were quick appointments. She had time to complain about the scar and the haircut and that was about it." 

"You referred her to Dr. Jackson?" Eames wondered out loud.

"Yes, my patients have had good luck with him before." He glanced at his watch. "Look, I wish I could help, but I'm double-booked right now, and I really need..." He was shuffling them toward the door.

Eames, having learned the art of annoyance from a pro, didn't budge. "She got in to see the doctor right away? I've heard psychiatrists are booked months in advance." Goren glanced up at Eames, furrowing his brow and scratching the back of his neck in his nervous habit, and wondered (among other things) how many of Dr. Nahme's female patients had gotten lucky with Dr. Jackson. 

"I have an... um, understanding with the doctor. He knows my patients need in right away. Can you please..."

"We'll stay in touch, Doctor," Eames said with a hint of warning.

As soon as Goren had closed the door behind him, Eames started running through theories. "Dr. Nahme would have access to Jackson's records of 'indiscretion.' He referred patients-_female _patients there anyway." She thought about this for a moment. "What if that wasn't poor research on his part?"

Goren nodded. "Lining them up for his buddy?"

"Maybe for a kickback."

"Wonder how many _men _he referred," he wondered.

Eames smiled. "Wanna bet on it? I'm still down eighteen dollars." She knew full well she wasn't. He'd insisted on buying the takeout and coffee for two weeks after she'd "lost" their bet.

He chuckled, then got an uncomfortable expression on his face, thinking about something she'd said. _I'm not giving her cause to start yelling at me _hereHis hand flew back to its favorite perch and he gestured toward the door.

xXx 

"You've never heard of him?" Eames asked into her desk phone "Dr. Campbell? Okay, thank you." She hung up and faced Goren. "That was the last male referral from Nahme in the past two months. None of his male patients went to or got any referral to Dr. Jackson. A few other names came up: Dr. Bahar, Dr. Tobin," Her eyes scrunched up as if believing squinting could change the word she'd jotted down. "Dr. Lector. Yikes. Talk about a career crippling name." She shook the thought of a medical clinic with the tagline "No, not _that _one!" then noticed an uncomfortable look on her partner's face. "You okay, Bobby?"

He took in a deep breath, steeling himself. "You _have _been reading about mental illness." This time, it wasn't a question. He looked up, tentative.

She looked at him appraisingly, then sighed. "Yes. I hope that doesn't upset you." 

Goren looked stunned. That wasn't the answer he'd been expecting. "Upset?" he asked.

She bit her lip. "I thought if you knew you would think I was... intruding on a part of your life that I shouldn't be in." She was paying an inordinate amount of attention to the paper sitting in front of her, a tactic which would have been more convincing if this particular paper hadn't been completely blank.

The dumbstruck look remained. "No one's ever... I mean, I haven't had someone who thought... well. Um, why?"

She shrugged, trying to cast off the gravity of the conversation. "I just figured I wouldn't be much of a friend if I didn't at least try to understand... well, you know, everything and... stuff," she finished lamely. She had the sense she had just lowered the comfort level by leaps and bounds. "Great, now I feel like I want to stick my head in the sand like an ostrich."

"Ostriches don't really- "

_"Bobby_," she said in a warning tone.

"Sorry. But don't feel bad. It's, um, nice." He was astounded. Nice didn't come close. Nobody ever tried to share that side of him. Everyone was quick to use his skills, enjoy his charm, but when it came to the pain that he lived with, nobody wanted to know, no one wanted to think about that part. He looked at her thoughtfully. Looked back at his desk. Looked up again, trying not to _look _like he was looking. _He's never very good at that,_ she thought. He jotted something down on his reminder notepad. _Why the heck does he _need _a reminder notepad anyway? _I'm_ the clueless one when it comes to remembering things: _

_I've just barely stopped writing a '2006' on all my checks and it's halfway through April! _

He was tentatively looking up again.

She indulged him by looking resolutely at her paperwork_. No, I don't see you making your bumfuddled puppy-dog expression. Again. _She could sense his relief_. Sucker._ "Lunch?"

"Pizza?"

"Deli. Fifth Street?"

"Too salty. Daniels'?"

"Not salty enough." She rolled her eyes. "Logan's there all the time. For some reason he loves that place. And even though he knows I hate it, every time we get takeout he always hints that I should bring some of that junk back for him. But most importantly, you don't like their fries," Eames added as if this finalized it.

"So? I won't get any. And you never get fries. Except the ones..."

"Except the ones I swipe off your plate when you're pretending you're not looking, which I can't do if you don't get any fries," she pointed out coolly. "Chinese. That way I won't swipe your fries at all."

"No you'll go for the fortune cookies."

"You're so good at reading people, detective." _Okay, so we're going to forget that anything of any importance just happened between us. If that's what you want..._

**xXx**

Thoughts? Please share. And after that, go to "All About Her" and "All About Him." That's right, I'm pimping my beta's stories! They deserve it.

And a cookie to any unfortunate geek who can name every horror movie reference in the story...


	9. Naughty Boy No, don't get your hopes up

**The Other Side**

**by LMR**

Disclaimer: I don't want to own CI. Just another thing I have to pack! Okay, I lied. I want it anyway.

A.N.: This chapter as it's written would not exist if it weren't for my wonderful Beta, Claire/guitar73girl. But don't blame her.

**Chapter 9: Naughty Boy (No, don't get your hopes up- it's not that kind of story)**

**xXx**

Office of Dr. Jason Jackson and Dr. D. Kwak, M.D.'s - 12:24 p.m. **Doink, doink**.

The room was crowded with potted plants that seemed to have a yearning to maim whatever unfortunate patient or detective dared enter their midst. Goren stumbled up to the front desk after Eames, practically falling right into a pot of red moss roses that managed somehow to frighten him just a bit. He wondered how two psychiatrists could have come up with such an un-relaxing waiting room for their practice. The best thing was by far the walls, a mellow mix of blue streaks that made them feel like they and the vicious vegetation were all deep underwater. A palm frond Eames had ruthlessly slapped out of her way richocheted and smacked Goren square on the nose. He almost laughed when she turned and winced in apology.

"Long as you don't try it with a cactus," he mumbled quietly. She gave him a look that clearly stated she'd try harder next time. After getting their last smirks, they adjusted their relationship for the benefit of the receptionist. Goren took in the way Eames turned a fraction more of her back to him, and the slight exasperated frown tugging at her lips. It meant they were going with 'Mutual Respectful Loathing' this time - a favorite when talking to witnesses.

The receptionist at the desk didn't seem to even notice them. The kid was lanky and tall with messy sandy hair. He wore clothes that were, technically, professional dress but were all un-tucked and rumpled. He was highlighting passages in a huge, worn book, and snatching up bites of deli food. "Can I help you?" he asked unenthusiastically.

Eames gestured to the badge clipped on her blouse. Goren did the same.

"I'm Detective Goren, this is Detective Eames, we need to talk to Dr. Jackson."

"I'm sorry, he's not here till two on Mondays. Duc comes in at one. I'm the only one here till then. Would you like to leave a message for him?" He still didn't look up at them.

_Nope, leave the doc as clueless as possible, _the Detectives communicated. "No, thanks," Eames answered. "But maybe we can ask you a few questions while we're here. You are...?" 

"I'm Tod Danie- Hey, what are you doing?" This was directed at Goren, who was picking up every object on the shelves and tables, turning them over, and poking them. Nathan, Eames mused, had just barely grown out of this phase. At least Bobby wasn't sticking everything in his mou - _spoke too soon.  
_  
"Not real gold," he said conversationally to Eames, gesturing with a small, antique-looking coin he'd picked up off a decorative table. Eames made a placating _you're an idiot_ look complete with patronizing smile, making sure Tod could see the look on her face. _That's right, Tod, we're complete morons, and you're going to go ahead and blab all kinds of stuff to us, aren't you? Good boy_.

"He sees a shiny object..." she explained casually. "Anyway, are you familiar with a patient named Persephone Morris?"

"Yeah, every other Tuesday. She'll be here tomorrow, if you want to talk to her. Could you please put that-"

Goren set down the cast iron fox he'd been examining and looked at the books stacked on the corner of the reception desk. "Spillane." He smiled. "Nice. Social psych, something by Dr. Key-al-dini," he mispronounced, making sure to establish an air of "duh."

"That looks like a good one. You're studying psychology?" He got a nod. "Well, it looks like you're working in the right place," he said, friendly, poking around the young man's desk, touching everything. He moved to read over Tod's shoulder.

"What is the high risk period of a bipolar patient? A unipolar depressive patient? Please explain." Goren mumbled, hovering uninvited over the young man's homework. He skimmed Tod's answer. "BP: risk highest in the lowest point of a depressive state... hm."

"That's just homework. I'm working on my thesis right now. It's on neuropsych." He said this with an air of importance, obviously trying to impress them. Goren could see a stash of typed pages that had been unceremoniously shoved into the cover of one of the worn textbooks. "Fries?" he offered, misinterpreting Goren's nosiness for a desire to mooch food.

"No thanks. I'm not crazy about that place," he said, distracted, attempting to lean so that the doctor's paperwork would come into view. It was only barely peeking out of a manila folder on the counter - finally revealing...

Absolutely squat.

"I'll make sure to tell my dad," the young man said sourly. 

Goren got a hint from his tone that he'd just said something wrong, but before he could ponder it any further, he noticed that Eames was subtly rapping her fingers on the counter at the back of the file. Every time they came up off the surface, her knuckles brushed the file forward, just slightly tipping the papers out the front.

She acted impatient to match the nonsequitur gesture. "Okay, you said his office hours start at two. When does he actually get _into _the office? For paperwork, maybe?" she grumbled distractingly, moving a little to the left, drawing Tod's eyes away from the leaning tower of Goren.

"No," the receptionist said flatly. "He comes in at t-"

"Oh!" Eames made a startled noise, and reached, too late, to pick up the papers that had just spilled all over the desk.

Tod gathered them up into a makeshift pile, grumbling an unconvincing "'Salright."

Goren conceded defeat. Nifty as Eames's trick was, all he'd seen were the files of a patient named Bessie Loudermilk. Aside from the humorous name factor, it wasn't useful. "Okay, we'll be back later. Sorry to bother you." At the door, he seemed to get an idea, and headed back. "Oh, and Tod? The high risk time for bipolar is at the very end of a manic phase."

Tod seemed annoyed at the fact that he'd been caught in a mistake, but scrambled to rewrite the answer. _He must be a pathetic student_, Eames figured. _He didn't even bother to cross-reference, just started making corrections based on the musings of a perceived coin-chomping idiot. What a clueless jerk._

Walking toward the SUV, Eames made an "excuse me" gesture to Goren, and snapped open her cell. "Eames." She listened for a minute. "Great, thanks." Hung up. "We've got a match on the DNA on Persephone's lingerie," she told Goren as they buckled in. "In the system because he used to do mandatory psychiatry for the department of corrections. Three guesses who."

"Dr. Jackson," Goren grumbled.

"He took advantage of her, and she tried to prove it. And for that..." She shook her head. After all these years, the lack of care one person could show another still astounded her. She put the car into gear and headed for Jackson's house.

**xXx**

Review, please!


	10. Blind

**The Other Side**

**By LMR**

Disclaimer: Why are you reading this disclaimer? For that matter, why are you reading this _story_? You should be reading _Harry Potter!_

A.N.: Thanks to Claire (guitar73girl), who reads this ridiculous thing and never complains, and surprisingly, never rolls her eyes. Or maybe she does. There's this pesky little Atlantic Ocean thing blocking my view of her. But at least she never lets on. Thank you, Claire.

A.N. 2: Sorry for the delay. Just moved.

**Chapter 10: Blind**

**xXx**

Home of Jason and Cece Jackson - 1:10 p.m. **Doink, doink**

"Hi, Mrs. Jackson?" Goren showed his badge after getting a nod. "I'm Detective Goren, this is my partner Detective Eames. I was hoping we could talk to your husband?"

She looked at them suspiciously, leaning in the doorframe. "Is he in trouble?"

"That's what we want to find out. We're investigating the murder of one of his clients," Eames said, studying her face for a reaction. 

Now she just looked confused. "Um, well, my husband is at the golf course right now, and he won't be back un-"

Goren maneuvered his way past the front door into the fancy entryway, making an offhand comment about the lovely drapery. He was inside before she could do anything but gasp at his audacity. Eames smiled sweetly. "May we come in?" She took Cece's gaping as a 'yes.' "We wanted to talk to _you _as well, actually." She was hoping the stress on the word would get her disconcerted. 

Just more confusion. "Well, um. I don't know how I could help you." She stood between them and the living room as if to keep them out. _Foolish mortal._

"Do you know any of your husband's clients, Mrs. Jackson?" Eames stared down at her from nearly a foot lower.

"No. That would be inappropriate."

"So tell me," Eames went on with the most obnoxious tone she could muster, joining her partner in the living room. "Is 'inappropriate' what your husband calls it when he sleeps with his clients?"

"Jason would _never_," Mrs. Jackson stressed. Eames glanced at her partner and gave a skeptical look. _She knows he is. _She gripped the back of a nice dining chair across from them before finally lowering herself to sit in it. "If you're referring to the accusations against him, they were all lies. They were mentally disturbed criminals, for Goodness' sake. They resented him because they associated him with their institutionalization." Eames raised an eyebrow at Goren. _Gee, that explanation didn't come right out of the doctor's mouth _verbatim

"Now unless you have some kind of warrant, I think you should get out of here."

But Goren had already made himself comfy on the plush living room sofa, and Eames followed suit.

_Hm. The drapes _are _pretty nice. _ Eames shook all thoughts of the décor, and got back to annoying Cece. "Do you recognize this, um, outfit, Mrs. Jackson?" She showed her a picture of the lacy pink thing, sliding it across the coffee table to her.

"No," she said, doing her best to sound very bored, trying not to pay attention.

"Too bad, 'cause your husband sure does. We found his DNA all over it." She let this sink in. "Any guesses where we found it?" Her only response was a patronizing look with what looked to the detectives like an undercurrent of worry. "It was in the closet of a client of his. The client who was found murdered on the street this morning. Where was your husband this morning?" she asked as though the question had just now occurred to her.

"I told you, the golf course, he's been there all morning." Eames looked at Goren and nodded slightly. He agreed. _Score one for her: She didn't think we were talking about three a.m_.

"How about before that? Earlier?"

"How early?"

"Still dark," was all Eames gave her.

"We were both asleep until 5:30, he was here until... ten, I showered, made some breakfast and then just about an hour ago I took my daughter over to her friend's house. Now," she started to rise, obviously ushering them to the exit. "My husband won't be home until late tonight."

"Where will he be?" Goren wondered, standing, but staying right in front of the sofa opposite the front door, not budging.

"He's going right from the course to his office hours, and from there to a convention he has to hit. He'll get home late. Now-"

"What about last night?" Eames wondered, finally standing.

"He was here all night," Cece said impatiently.

"Do you have somewhere to go, because I notice you're pushing us to the door," Goren said, calling upon his keenest observational skills.

"Well, I only do snack runs for the kids' game the first week of the month," she babbled. "But believe me, I wish it _were _this week, because I'd really like have a good reason to kick you out right now." She folded her arms across her chest.

"Oh, I'm sure we would fit in the car," Eames countered jovially, not missing a beat. "We don't take up much room." She could see Goren desperately trying to hide his face at that one. _Note to self: Stop making Bobby laugh in front of witnesses._

"Will you be going with him to the convention?" Goren asked conversationally.

"No, spouses aren't invi-" It suddenly seemed to occur to Cece how ridiculous it was for her to be telling them something so trivial when she was trying so desperately to get them out of her home. Flustered, she changed the topic. "Just get out of here. You can talk to him at his office. He'll tell you, he was right here."

Eames noticed a framed photo of the family on the table next to the sofa. _Oh, goody, time for picture poking. _

Sure enough, Goren reached for the photo. "Oh, that's your daughter? Nice picture."

"Yes, that's Winona. Please go now."

"Oh, she's so cute!" Eames gushed, not budging. "You know, my partner is great with kids. He has this way of getting them to open up; it's so sweet. They always love talking to him. You know, we could just wait a little while, in case your husband decides to stop back here before he heads to the office." 

"Okay, okay." She snatched the picture back. "He didn't come home last night. I don't know where he was, okay? Happy? Now just, please, get out of here before my daughter comes home." She resumed herding them to the door.

xXx

"I know that look," Eames said on their way to the SUV. "That's not a woman who's trying to give her husband an alibi, that's a wife who's determined to wear blinders about what her husband's doing: She's telling us what she wants to believe herself."

"If Jackson did do it," Goren speculated. "She doesn't _think _he did. If she did, she wouldn't have given in so easily; she would have tried harder. Her lying wasn't about the murder at all."

"If it had been, though, it would have given her an alibi, too, you know," Eames pointed out. "Her husband would back her up, and if she _did _know about Persephone, I don't imagine she'd have liked her too much. If that kid goes to bed about eight, probably. Looks like we've got another suspect and still no alibis." She frowned, settling into her seat. "Spouses aren't invited. That makes no sense." She raised an eyebrow. "Whatcha' want to bet it's only _his _spouse that's not invited?"

"He wants women that feel they owe him something," Goren surmised, nodding. "His date's likely to be another client. Think that might convince Carver to let us bring him in for questioning?" he asked, with little hope.

Eames actually snorted as she buckled up. "Yeah, because Carver is just the biggest fan of our technique." She paused thoughtfully. "We might be able to bring him in on an abuse of power charge. Jackson, I mean, not Carver." She shook the admittedly pleasant thought of dragging Carver into the interrogation room. "What he's doing with these clients is unethical _and _illegal." Goren was giving her a dubious look. "Oh, come on, we've brought people in for illegal _parking_, Bobby. We have to try."

"If I said this case was giving me a splitting headache..." Goren wondered, tentative.

"...I'd say keep trying because that one really sucked," she informed him judiciously. "Deal with it, Bobby, I'm the funny one."

He pouted all the way to Carver's office.

xXx

Office of ADA Ron Carver - Approximately five yards away from the elevator - 2:17 and 13 seconds p.m. **Doink, Doink.**

"It's not enough, Detectives," Carver told them sternly. "I'm inclined to agree, but the DNA on the clothes _isn't _enough to pin the murder on him."

"She was blackmailing him," Eames insisted. "His family, his career, maybe even his freedom, all on the line, and he blamed her. We know he'd had affairs with clients before."

"We know there's been _speculation _that he'd been inappropriate with clients," Carver corrected her. "There's a difference." Eames's jaw set.

"What would you need for probable cause?" Goren asked, taking his curious, challenging stance, arms folded across his chest.

"An admission of an affair," he conceded. "I would go for an admission in a casual setting. Some indicator of a tangible history of indiscretion. Then you might have enough to hold him." 

Eames nodded thoughtfully. "Well, we haven't confronted him yet," she offered. "But if we _do _try to approach him outright, I don't think even your nifty little 'cough twice' thing will get him." Goren chuckled. "Too bad, I liked that thing." They both knew what option was left. "Just for once, what if _I'm _the sleazebag and _you're _the bimbo?" she proposed.

"No, you can't pull off sleazebag." He winced, instantly knowing that this hadn't come off as quite the compliment he'd intended, knowledge which, judging by the smirk on her face, seemed to amuse Eames to no end.

"We have a psychiatrists' convention to hit," she said simply, pretending to ignore the slip. She handed over the keys. "Sleazebags drive their bimbos," she pointed out.

"That chain include the keys to the doghouse?" he wondered under his breath.

**xXx**

A.N.: Okay, technically, I know they have more than enough to bring in the doc. But my way is more fun; trust me.


	11. The Requisite Dancing Scene

**The Other Side**

**by LMR**

A.N.: Again, a huge thanks to guitar73girl Claire, one of maybe five people on the planet who knows what to do with a semicolon.

Disclaimer:

Dear Mr. Wolf: After careful consideration, we have decided that we like fanfiction better than the show. While we've enjoyed solving your little mysteries for you, we find the things that we do on to be far more entertaining and relaxing. Also, they usually end in sex. Regards, Detectives Goren and Eames P.S.: You're invited to all 237 of our weddings.

**Chapter 11: The Requisite Dancing Scene**

**xXx**

Psychiatrist's Convention - The Ritz-Carlton - 6:24 p.m. **Doink, Doink.**

Eames was fuming as they got out of the SUV. "As soon as our act is over, you are giving me those keys, and you are never _touching _them again!" she hissed. "You drive like an adolescent monkey with ADD!" She gave Goren a pause for laughter before continuing. "Two o'clock. I'm going to stop at the coat room. Chat him up for a while."

He nodded, handing her his coat.

Goren walked to the two o'clock area and found Dr. Jackson sitting at a booth with a creature that was apparently supposed to be a woman. He smiled disarmingly. "Room for two more here, Doctor?" Jackson gave a _be my guest _hand wave. "My date'll be back in a minute. Coat check," Goren explained. "She probably got lost in there," he added disdainfully.

Jason put out a hand. "What they're best at, eh? Dr. Jason Jackson."

Bobby shook, loathing this man already. His attitude toward women was noxious enough, but what kind of pumped up egomaniac needed to introduce himself as "doctor" at a doctors' convention? "Nice to meet you. Dr. Robert Goren," he responded.

"Doctor Goren, this is my date, Ariana Hyde." He gestured to the flashy fake blonde woman beside him (_The _bad _kind of fake blonde,_ Goren mentally amended, hoping their telepathy didn't work long distance). She was wearing an abundance of gaudy gold jewelry and wearing an obnoxious red dress.

"Now doesn't she look beautiful?" Goren nodded, confused. "I told you, how many times this dress was fine. But you just wanted to keep changing t' kingdom come, never happy with anything." Goren was finding it difficult not to start lecturing the good doctor on respect, but fortunately, Ariana seemed to be missing the insult entirely, staring at her nails, clearly bored. "Women!"

"Tell me about it. My date, well, I told her I was headed over here, she probably needs a trail of breadcrumbs," he grumbled. "Neurotic little... well that's what I get for sleeping with a -" he looked at Doctor Jackson, tentative. The doctor was obviously filling in the blanks, mentally categorizing "Doctor Goren" as a kindred spirit in his brotherhood of slime. _Bingo. _"Well, never mind. She's a little bit of a ditz, anyway. She'll be back in a minute."

That's when he saw Alex, still on the other side of the room, not yet visible to Dr. Jackson. She'd kept her long coat on for the ride over, and now Bobby made sure to get the stupid staring out of his system before he had to start treating her badly. Her skirt was long, purple toward the top and faded down into yellow, with streaking clouds mixing the colors together. It looked like she was wearing a sunrise. The top that went with it was gold, had sparkling beads all over it, and was sleeveless.

_Sleeveless is good_, he thought.

She looked amazing.

And she couldn't resist giving him a wink from Alex before the insufferably dim "Lexi" came to the surface.

"Baby, you started without me," she said in a voice somewhere between a whine and a coo. Bobby inwardly cringed. He was not, however, too disgusted by the voice to kiss her lightly on the hand before pulling her down into the booth beside him. She allowed herself to be pulled, and flopped obediently into her place, looking at him with doey eyes that would have made the real Alex want to puke.

Bobby gestured to Eames (_Is that actually Eames?!_) "Doctor, this is my-"

"Girlfriend. Lexi. Hi." She stuck her hand out and shook weakly, then introduced herself to Ariana.

A lovely waitress hovered over the table. "Hi, I'm Camilla, I'll be your server tonight. What can I get for you?" She turned first to Alex. _Ladies first,_ Bobby supposed, and Ariana looked more like a plastic doll than a woman.

"I'll have the cannerd eww veen rogue, please," stumbled out of Alex's mouth. She glanced over at Bobby, giving him a questioning look. To anyone else, it would have been a pathetic look, a desperate need for approval, but her smile was entirely more cognizant than Lexi was capable of. _I just dare you not to laugh. _He restrained himself, but barely.

Hyde swiped a strand of hair behind her ear, the lousy bottle blonde streaks now second place to a loud red earring as "ugliest thing in the room."

"I'll have the fish," she offered simply.

"Stuffed pork, please," Dr. Jackson ordered. Alex nearly snorted, and Bobby could tell they both found this selection too fitting.

"I'll have the cannerd eww veen rogue, as well," Bobby insisted as if he saw nothing at all off about this, and no indication that his date was a complete moron. Alex gave him a look and he understood. _Being selfless is out of character. Be a jerk. _He switched up his motive. "Sorry, Lexi, but that was about the funniest foul-up I've heard in the last month. I couldn't resist." Alex looked slightly hurt, and he had the feeling that, underneath the act, she was slightly bummed that she wasn't allowed to be clever enough to make a "fowl-up" joke.

The detectives knew that they were never going to get anything out of the doctor with Ariana right there, so they deigned to small-talking with the jerk for the first five minutes of waiting for their order. Bobby, just staying in character, of course, stroked Alex's arm, trying to look possessive rather than loving. Much to his relief, Alex didn't seem to mind.

_Wow, she's a better actress than I thought! _Bobby mused absently. _Some professional actresses don't even remember to tilt their head away from somebody they're supposed to be attracted to. And she's biting her lip, too._

_She's a really good pretender._

Ariana fluttered her lashes. "You know, I never thought I would date a doctor. I can't even stand _going _to the doctor. It's the needles," she admitted, shivering. "But I've got a doctor who doesn't deal with the blood stuff, so good for me."

Alex mentally winced. If she had any clue how untrue that really was...

Bobby rattled his fork against the table, bored. "You know, we should find something to do while we wait." He turned to his partner. "Dance?" he offered, putting on the puppy dog face in spite of his role as a cad. Dr. Jackson was following their lead, asking Ariana to join him on the floor. Perfect.

"Sure," Alex said in her idiot voice. They got to their feet and settled into each other. _Yay, backless!_ "Finish this song, then trade?" she asked sans stupid voice as she curled into his arms, head comfortably on his chest. He nodded. Bobby's fingers accidentally brushed the skin on her back, and he felt her start, then relax.

"Hmm."

Bobby desperately searched his mental Woman-noise to English pocket dictionary (not that it was ever very reliable).

**Hmm:**

Pronun. hĕmm

_interj._

Used to express one of three sentiments:

1. I am going to kill you for that.

2. I'm sleepy.

or 3. That feels **good.**

_Well, I can at least _pretend _it was the last one, _he figured, glad for the fact that 'Doctor Goren' would never be enough of a gentleman to force his fingers back onto the fabric. _Nope, Doctor Goren would just keep on tracing little sideways figure eights on his date's skin._

"I feel like an idiot," Alex informed him. Although her voice was back to normal, she kept the simpering smile on her face as she spoke, making her look like a ventriloquist.

"Your pretending to be vapid doesn't look like an idiot. It looks like a remarkably talented actress."

He could feel her smile against him. "Aw, that's really sweet. Kinda' like that cute shade of pink you're turning right now." She patted his chest reassuringly, making sure to brush against the buttons. _Because I can,_ she figured.

"Glad you're enjoying my discomfort," he answered quietly, causing her face to scrunch up.

"Discomfort?" she asked pointedly, but didn't press it any further, mostly because those nice little shapes were still dancing around on her back. "Say something, anything, so I can giggle like an airhead."

He tried to keep his face controlling and harsh. "I'm sorry I said I was uncomfortable. I'm not, actually." He sounded startled at this. "And you're a very good dancer."

She giggled nauseatingly. "Oh, Bobby! You're so funny." She blinked for a long moment and tilted her head forward almost imperceptibly. She was sayi..._Oh, you figure that one out, I'm sick of giving you subtitles!_ The ballad was coming to an end, and they worked their way closer to Dr. Jackson and his date.

"Lexi, would you be terribly jealous if I asked Ariana to dance?" he asked, technically to Alex, but his eyebrows were raised in deference to Dr. Jackson, as if asking permission.

"Oh, I don't want you to go," Alex whined. It was a terrible sound coming from her.

"It's a three minute song, Babe. I'll think you'll live," he said with annoyance and a tone of condescension. When she pouted, a look that didn't sit well on her face at all, he kissed her on the cheek. "I'll be right back, I promise." He was speaking to her as if she was a five year old, imitating her pout. He offered Ariana his arm.

"Well, if your date is going to steal mine," the psychiatrist said, speaking to her in much the same tone. "Why don't I steal his?"

Alex drew upon every ounce of annoying she had, and giggled the most irritating giggle she had ever giggled in her life. "Sure." She took the doctor's arm, while trying to keep her face neutral, as if Bobby's gesture was an everyday exchange rather than one that was making her insides do backflips. They started to dance. "You two are such a cute couple," Alex gushed. "How did you meet?"

"The same way you and Dr. Goren did. She was my client."

"Oh, really? I'm surprised he told you. Bobby said when we started that it was kind of risky. Aren't you afraid of getting in trouble?"

"Well, technically, shh," he said conspiratorially to her. "Technically, I'm not supposed to ever get... involved with a client. But things happen, and some things are just worth bending the rules for. You can understand that?"

"Of course," she agreed. "But did you have any idea what you were getting into?" She sounded genuinely interested, wide-eyed. "Weren't you afraid you'd get caught?"

"Well, I knew I could..." He lowered his voice to a whisper. "Our little secret?" Alex nodded brightly. "I knew I could handle it, because you know. I had, well-"

"Oh," she said, throwing him an admiring look. "You naughty boy!" she said quietly. "You've practiced a little, haven't you?"

"Don't tell Ariana." He winked.

She furrowed her brow as if really concerned for his well-being. "How did you handle, the, you know, the breakups?"

"It was a little tough to take care of those. It took some, uh, maneuvering. But I got it all, well, sorted out, let's just say." He didn't catch the nod that his dancing partner passed her date around his shoulder. Nodding back, Bobby led Ariana back toward the other two and softly excused himself.

"I don't know if that's a good idea," she said, still with her concerned voice. "But you know what's a really bad idea?" Her voice returned to normal. "Telling me and my partner all about it. Dr. Jackson, you're under arrest for the murder of Persephone Morris." He struggled as she took his arm forcefully. "I suggest you stop fighting me, see _Detective _Goren has kind of a protective big brother thing going on, so he already thinks you're slime for pawing me, don't make him _really _mad by getting rough with me." She passed him off to a waiting officer who'd been playing the role of rent-a-cop in the corner.

Alex made a gesture as if to wipe the doctor off her arms. He'd been exploring the edge of her blouse as if his fingers were trying to figure out where the rest of the shirt had disappeared to. And that thing her stomach had done wasn't nearly as nice as what it had been doing when Bobby's hands had done the same thing.

"Big brother thing?" Goren asked, looking straight ahead at nothing as Jackson was taken to the squad car, where another officer read him his rights.

Eames looked sideways up at him, appraisingly. "Isn't that what it is?" she asked casually.

"Yeah, 'course." He walked away, and she was sure she could hear him mumble something about "transferred to Major Case Alabama, maybe."  
**  
xXx**

A.N.: Alex's dress design is credited to The Sims.

A.N. 2: Bad-wordy calls from Alabama may go directly to Detective Robert Goren at 212-555-0146.

Please review. Unless you're an English teacher. I heard enough from them in high school to last a lifetime.


	12. Messing With His Head

**The Other Side**

**by LMR**

Disclaimer: CI belongs to Dick Wolf, who had better damn well be bluffing about splitting the dream team!

A.N.: My Beta is on vacashun, so I hope I ddin't make any big misteaks.

**Chapter 12: Messing With His Head**

**xXx**

Eames sat in the chair opposite the doctor in the harsh gray interrogation room. "First things first. My name is 'Detective Eames,' and from this moment on, if you ever call me 'Lexi' again, I'll find myself facing a police brutality charge, although I'm fairly certain the other officers wouldn't see a thing."

"I can't believe you actually think I killed someone."

Eames looked incredulous. "'Took some maneuvering,' I believe you said. And 'let's just say I took care of it.' And you're actually asking why we brought you in? Seems pretty self-explanatory to me." 

"I admit it sounds bad, but I wasn't talking about murder! I just didn't want to give strangers the details of the whole thing. I shouldn't have brought it up at all."

Goren, who'd been standing silently in the corner enjoying Eames's threats, moved toward the doctor and smiled. "But you had to." He wagged his finger at him. "You had to brag about it. You had to let us know, didn't you? Had to let her know how you had your clients, your female clients," he clarified. "Lined up around the block. That her doctor wasn't the only one playin' around. You needed us to know that you were manipulating her." He raised his voice. "That you were manipulating all your female clients. Just like you manipulated Persephone." He slammed the Polaroid of the victim down right in front of the doctor, who refused to look at it.

"Me manipulating _her_! No, she was the one who..." He looked between them, indignation giving way to the jitters. "I want a lawyer."

Eames nodded, knowing that Ross, on the other side of the mirror, was arranging it. "We love it when you people say that halfway through an interrogation. We can tell exactly what you said that you're kicking yourself for instead of just figuring you're lying about everything. Now, you say she was the one manipulating you. Why would you not want us to know that? Any thoughts, Goren?"

He gave a shrug like he was taking a wild guess. "I'd say it has something to do with that DNA evidence Persephone was keeping. Did she tell you about it? Say she was going to tell your wife if you didn't pay her off?" Goren was doing what Eames had come to think of as his "Tilty Head Thingie." She knew he was looking at the doctor's pulse in his neck; measuring his blink rate. 

"I'm not answering any more questions until that lawyer gets here."

"Sounds like a 'yes' to me," Eames surmised. "We already know she had a steady source of income even without disability. She was getting money from somewhere - a lot, too. Maybe you didn't want to keep paying her bills, hm? Found a better way to make sure she didn't tell your wife? 'Took care of it,' right?"

Luckily for Jason, this was when Public Defender Shafenstein joined them in the interrogation room.

Not that Jason was really _that _lucky.

"Counselor," Goren nodded in greeting. He looked to the doctor, smiling. "I think you just answered our question about... about the blackmail." He scratched the back of his head, looking hesitant and only slightly gleeful.

Eames smiled smugly. "Why would Dr. Jason Jackson," she said the name with the kind of importance the doctor would use himself. "Let himself get stuck with a..." she looked Shafenstein up and down, decided to keep her thoughts to herself. "With a public defender?"

"No offense, Counselor, you're perfectly competent," Goren lied as the defender took a seat beside his client. "But a bigshot like you, doc? A public defender? Come on!" He was raising his voice, goading him. He lowered it again, getting down close to Jackson. "Maybe your income isn't what it used to be, hm? Money problems lately? The money problems Persephone Morris certainly wasn't having."

"She was _not _blackmailing me!" He insisted.

Shafenstein hesitated, jumped when he realized that the detectives were both looking at him expectantly. "Oh! Um, yeah." He leaned close to Jackson, whispered something in his ear. Eames rolled her eyes.

Jackson sighed, straightening up. "Persephone was blackmailing me," he said with all the dignity he could muster.

"Smooth," Eames complimented. "We'd kind of figured that out for ourselves, but thanks for your sincere cooperation."

"She said she would go to my wife, the APA, about a thousand different doctors' ethics groups. So I just went ahead and paid her. But I didn't kill her."

"When did the blackmailing start, Doctor?" Goren wondered calmly.

"The end of March," he answered, resigned. It was her last appointment... the Tuesday two weeks ago. She asked for twenty-five thousand up front. She left her notebook at my office Tuesday 'accidentally,' and came back for it Friday, to pick up the money. I mean, if I were going to kill her, don't you think I would have done it _then_? Before she made off with my money?"

Shafenstein turned slightly green at this, and started hissing at his client to stop throwing out fun little hypotheticals. 

"You said 'up front,'" Eames pointed out. "She asked for further payment?"

The doctor seemed surprised. "No. I expected her to. But that was all, and I haven't heard from her since. I was relieved. Until I found out she was dead," he added hastily. "Which I didn't do!"

Eames barely kept herself from rolling her eyes. "But you can't tell us where you were this morning between midnight and five, can you?"

"I was at home with my wife. Ask her!"

"Nah," Goren said, back in his corner leaning against the wall. He waved the alibi off, smiling like a kid. "She already rolled on you."

"She, she rol- What?"

Eames kept up the dismissive act, figuring an ego like the doc's might react well to the tactic. "Oh, she told us you weren't there," she said, not paying much attention to the doctor. "You gonna say you were with Ariana, or do you have another one we don't know about?"

"It was Ariana. Please don't tell Cece. It would break her heart."

Eames nearly snorted. "Give us Ariana's number and we'll see about your alibi," she intoned as if she were bored with him.

The doctor swallowed and shifted in his chair, looking at the double mirror unhappily, very aware of how guilty he looked. "I don't actually have... She left. We were at Lavanna's Inn on Home Avenue. But she left about eleven, eleven fifteen, maybe. I was half-asleep at the time, I was too groggy to even think of going home. I just wanted to go back to bed."

Goren put the triumphant kid look back on his face, wagging a finger back and forth. "So nobody knows where you were at the time of the murder."

"No," Dr. Jackson grumbled. 

"Well, all dressed up and nowhere to go but your cell." Eames stood. "Too bad. That _canard au vin rouge _sounded good." She shrugged at Goren as they left the room. _I couldn't resist._

xXx

Eames yawned over her paperwork, glad to have their prime suspect in custody.

"What if the doctor wasn't the only one Persephone was blackmailing?" Goren tossed out, looking through the girl's notebook.

"You think there was somebody else?" Eames wondered, annoyed at his ability to find loose ends. She frowned. "But one other thing has been bothering me: If she left early that means Ariana has no alibi, either," she pointed out. Getting a quizzical look from her partner, she shrugged. "Another woman scorned, never know." 

"She didn't strike me as the jealous type. She didn't seem to mind when you went to dance with the doctor," Goren pointed out.

_That's because it meant she got to borrow the hot doctor,_ Eames figured, deciding not to share her deductive reasoning out loud. "Well, when we were talking to Hyde she..." She drifted off here because Goren's face had the daze of digression. She waited expectantly.

Predictably, he started rapping his hand impatiently on the top of his desk. "_Hyde_. Split brain- I can't believe I didn't think of that before," he mumbled. "Gotta talk to the M.E..." he said under his breath, walking out of the room.

Eames watched all this calmly. _Okay, whatever._ Her threshold for absurdity tolerance was abnormally high. She simply shrugged and went back to her papers and crime scene photos, taking the opportunity to sneak a fortune cookie left over from lunch. Sure enough, a moment later, her partner appeared sheepishly by the edge of her desk. "Forget something, Bobby?" she asked, clearly amused. He mumbled an apology.

"I want to take another look at the bruise on Persephone's neck."

"What are you thinking?"

"Eames, this is going to sound outrageous, so if you could just hear me out bef-

"Spit it out," she instructed. "Outrageous doesn't mean much to me anymore."

"I'm thinking Persephone was murdered by her left hand." 

**xXx**

Now that's what I call a cliffhanger! I'm asking you to trust me again here.

A.N.: Shafenstein is a character created for the show in the episode "Shadow of Tomorrow." He's not mine.

Please review!


	13. Tradeoff

**The Other Side**

**By LMR**

Disclaimer: **"**LMR don't own CI! She's just a crazy foo' with a computer who oughta be locked up with that other crazy foo'! Whachoo mean I'm in the wrong fic? It says BA, foo'!"

A.N.: Most Betas: No one's going to pick up on that you overly subtle knucklehead! How the heck are we supposed to notice that!? If you have to explain it in the Beta notes, it's not clear enough. Who do you think you are, Shakespeare!? Claire: Um, I think you might be a bit too obtuse here, dear. Thanks for the tactful Beta'ing whilst (you better be) furiously working to update "All About Him."

A.N. 2: I want to thank everyone for trusting me after that last line.

**Chapter 13: Tradeoff **

**xXx**

This bizarre proclamation stopped Eames right in the middle of her larcenous exploits with Bobby's fortune cookies. "Her..." She just stared. "What!?"

"I think it was a case of _le main étrange_."

"The weird hand?" she translated, no less in the dark.

"Yes, sort of, it's alien hand. It's very rare, but not unheard of. There's a disorder, it's called Alien Hand Syndrome, or Dr. Strangelove Syndrome." He was gesturing enthusiastically, animated. "When the connection between the right and left brain is severed, like it was in Persephone, with her surgery, well, the right brain doesn't like to be separated, I guess you'd say. It seems to take on it's own personality." He shifted from seeming excited to positively embarrassed to be relaying this information, knowing how absurd it sounded. "A violent, destructive personality. The left side of the body, the side controlled by the right brain, perpetrates violence against the whole individual, sometimes even attempting to kill the person." He paused, sighing. "There's a chance Persephone's left hand murdered her."

"Bobby," she started gently. "You know I trust your judgment implicitly," She made sure to get a nod before continuing. "But that is the stupidest thing I have ever heard."

He laughed. "I know." He shook his head. "When I first read it, I thought the neurology textbook was pulling my leg. I had to cross-reference five journal articles before I actually believed it. The brain is..." He gestured with his hand as if to say that there was simply no word adequate to finish the sentence.

She had been typing furiously as he talked. Now her brow furrowed, and she stared incredulously at the screen. "Oh my God, you're serious. This is like something out of a bad horror movie."

"Several, actually," he pointed out. She rose and together they headed for the morgue.

xXx

They stood over the body. "We presumed a right hand before. It _would _have been a right hand if the person was facing her. But if the hand was coming toward her from someone standing in her position, it would be a left hand." He gently picked up Persephone's hand in his, moved it up to her own neck.

The pattern fit.

"You mean she did this to herself?" the temporary asked.

"No," Eames said, reaching for the girl's left arm, remembering the fingernail scrapings. She turned it palm-up toward them, then pulled the right hand up beside it, recreating the scratches tracing down the girl's skin.

"She tried to stop it," Goren filled in.

"Detective?..." This was directed at Eames, clearly the only one whose judgment the temp M.E. was going to trust on a _good _day.

"You're right. You can see the imprint of the ring here," Eames said, ignoring the M.E. She ran her finger over the loose ring. "Alien Hand it is."

Goren stared at the floor as though deep in thought. "You know," he said conversationally. "I think Ross likes you better."

"Don't even think about it."

xXx

Stretched out on Goren's living room carpet, various takeout boxes littering the floor and the sofa, the partners examined crime scene photos and various bits of paperwork from the offices, the apartment complex, the Wa- er, the candy factory - anything to try to piece together Persephone's everyday life. Anything to find a better explanation than something about alien hands. Eames rested her chin on a blanket she'd commandeered, hugging it to herself.

"There's no mention of the blackmailing in any of these chicken scratches. She wouldn't have wanted to leave a paper trail."

"These, here," Goren pointed to a corner of a page in a notebook she'd jotted in. 'J', tally marks under it, twenty five, that's her blackmail, in thousands. There's 'N'."

"Nahme. No tallies: She hadn't started with him yet, I guess. Her next appointment was tomorrow." She looked at her watch. "Today," she corrected. She leaned into Goren's shoulder to read the marks. 'T'?" She looked at him quizzically. "The secretary kid, maybe? What'd she have on him?"

Goren frowned; reached for the textbook they'd found in her cubby. "Abrynna said she'd been borrowing books." He flipped to the dog-eared page. "Here. 'Identical.' It's a passage about neurology. That's his thesis topic. If he was keeping his papers in the books he lent her... Well, we already saw what a good student he is. What if the papers in the book matched the passages in the book? Close enough to be plagiarism?" he proposed.

"Tod said he's always alone in the office on Mondays." She sighed in exasperation. "We have all these creeps with motives and no alibis, and the kid probably died a natural, albeit freaky, death. Can we save all these suspects for a rainy day?" She paused and looked at him seriously. "We have to be _absolutely positive _about this disorder thing before we deliver it to Ross. You know that if you're sure, I'm with you.

"But _please _tell me you're sure."

"Jackson might be able to tell us more about Persephone's condition..." his voice trailed off, not liking where this was going.

"If we don't report his consorting with his patients," Eames finished. "That's some tradeoff. Same deal with Nahme, huh?" Goren nodded, somewhat dejected. "Nahme said the problem wasn't too bad, but Kari said her hands weren't working together," Eames offered. "Actually, her exact words were 'It was like half of her had gone funky like that Steve Martin movie kinda.'"

Goren laughed a little. "More or less what Abrynna said. Not quite as colorfully."

"You'd think someone would have mentioned if one of her hands just started attacking her out of the blue? I mean, that _is _pretty noticeable."

Goren frowned at the crime scene photo he was holding. "There's something wrong in this picture," he said after staring at it for ten minutes.

"Feel like elaborating?" his partner wondered. It was a real question, one without sarcasm. He was uncomfortably shifting around on the floor, and she handed him a throw pillow from the sofa hoping he would get the subtext: _I'm falling asleep_.

But Bobby just absently thanked her and resumed looking at the picture. Unable to sit still, he adjusted the pillow again, set it on his lap; put the picture on the pillow. Turned his head one way. The other way. Shifted again. The picture was too close, he decided. He put the picture on the floor this time and used the pillow as a chin rest. Turned the picture upside down. Now sideways. Sideways the other way.

This continued for about ten minutes. Ten minutes of Bobby fidgeting, mutilating the poor pillow, and turning the picture every which way he could, still not seeing what was odd about it. And ten minutes of Alex trying not to fall asleep with just the loose puke green throw from the sofa as a pillow of her own. Finally, when he held it up in front of his face sitting cross legged on the floor, about the fifteenth different angle he had tried so far, Eames picked up her throw and moved to sit opposite him, intently staring at the back of the picture, squinting at it.

He looked at her questioningly. "What are you doing, Eames?" he asked, in a tone that suggested it was clearly something ridiculous.

"I'm using the light from that lamp behind you to see the crime scene in a mirror image which also serves to soften the contrast of the blood spray to the pavement thus allowing me to blah, blah, blah. I'm making a _point_, Bobby." She took the picture from his hand and set it resolutely back in its file. "This isn't doing any good. The Superbrain needs sleep. And yours could use some, too." She poked him with a foot.

"Yeah, you're right," he conceded. "I might stay up a while, but you should call a..." He let the sentence drop off when he saw that she was falling asleep sitting up. If he didn't get her to bed soon, he would have to carry her there.

He added that to the growing list of images he would have to banish from his overactive imagination.

"I'll get some extra bedding."

"Mm-hm."

He started gathering up the photos and files and put them away in various folders and his portfolio. He took the stray bits of deli takeout leftovers to the trash, picked up Eames's throw and other useless decorative things from the sofa and headed for his bedroom. He absently flopped the extras in the corner, reconsidered, and laid Alex's throw gently on the bed. When he came back, he was carrying a big stack of folded blankets in addition to a sheet and pillow. "This place is heated for someone with more insulation, so I got these out." She took the liberty of looking entertained at the presence of one with little pink roses and hearts all over it, raising an eyebrow.

"I got it when I'd just moved out on my own. My aunt had some extras..." he answered defensively. "Hey, all the others are navy." He scowled when her expression didn't change. "You're not as funny as usual at one in the morning, you know that?"

"That's okay, that pouty little kicked puppy look is funny enough for both of us. But why didn't you just bring back that other thing that I alre- oh, never mind, I'm so tired I'll sleep with..." she reconsidered. "No, I won't, I'm not touching that girlie thing. Gimme a blue one."

She got onto the sofa and cuddled down into the bedding. "Thank you."

"Good night, Alex." He paused, puzzled at the mock-awestruck look on her face. "What's that look for?"

"You said the A-word. I was beginning to think you were allergic to my first name." She stuck her foot out and kicked his leg lightly, then pulled the throw pillow up off the floor and held it to her. "'Night, Bobby." She took a deep breath and smiled contentedly, drawing comfort from it, and willed herself to sleep.

Two hours later, she still hadn't willed herself quite enough in that direction. Despite Bobby's best efforts, the sofa was uncomfortable, and being in someone else's home had always kept her awake.

Well, she sometimes read to go to sleep, and there would be no shortage of reading material here. And she had the feeling most of said material would work as a surefire cure for insomnia, too.

She meandered toward the bookcase. One of them, anyway. The books were divided by subject, then by language. She noticed that the languages themselves were alphabetized. English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latin, Mandarin, Russian, Spanish. Then alphabetized by author. Books on the same topic by the same author were in chronological order of publication.

She made a mental note to make fun of him about this. She kept a cache of playful insults on hand for those times that, for whatever reason, she had to be really nice to him.

It made him nervous.

One section caught her eye. Psychology and Mental Disease.

She browsed the section. The DSM-IV. Diagnostic Statistical Manual. Every mental condition known to humanity in one large volume. _Hmph_. Maybe _Bobby _could read through that thing as if it were the Sunday funnies, but to Alex, it might as well have been the entire _Harry Potter _series written in Sumerian cuneiform. About as thick, too.

She looked around almost guiltily, as she pulled another hefty volume of the shelf.

She'd read all kinds of technical things about the illnesses in her own research, but nothing she'd read had had the personal stories this book gave. She was anxious (No, _eager_, she corrected herself, momentarily annoyed with Bobby for orienting her toward permanent geekdom.) to read these, knowing that they would give her insight into what he was really feeling. And since they were his books, maybe...

Yup, here it was, a worn and revisited page.

This was where she'd find Bobby.

**xXx**

A.N.: I realize absurdity is par for the course here, but to quote the great Dave Barry: **I am **_**not **_**making this up. **AHS is a real disorder. I know, I know, it's the stupidest thing I've ever heard of, too.


	14. His Other Side

**The Other Side**

**by LMR**

**Chapter 14: His Other Side**

Thanks as always to Claire both for Beta'ing and for giving us "All About Him," which I know you have all read by now or else!

**xXx**

The worn page was full of snippets from interviews with those personally affected by mental illness.

There are so many painful little things that people don't think about. Sometimes when I have my period, I just melt down and cry in the bathroom because I know that these cramps and ruined clothes are all for nothing: I wouldn't pass on my genes anymore than a person with early onset Alzheimer or Lou Gehrig's. And even if my kids don't get it, theirs might, or theirs. It's too big a risk.

Friends, even strangers, try to change my mind. Like I've just blown off the idea of having children without a second thought.

I hate it when people try to cheer me up with false optimism about it. "Any child you have will be perfect," they say. "Because it's yours." I just roll my eyes and do my best to remember that somewhere in there is a kind heart with a big mouth.

Of _course _my child will be perfect.

And my perfect child will suffer.

Brighid- a twenty-five year old female with bipolar 1

People think I'm in the clear because I've made it to my thirties. I mean, yeah, I'm grateful 'cuz I've seen what it can do and it hasn't happened to me...but it doesn't mean I can breathe a sigh of relief. I'll relax when I've gone senile and my brain is so gone I won't notice a disorder. (laughs a little) Ever since I was twenty-four, I've kind of lived with the knowledge that it's a distinct possibility that I'll have a break of my own. It could be anything that triggers it. I might have to go a hospital, or a group home or something. I hate when people who don't live with this quote me the statistics about age of onset. As if I don't know them already? Okay, fine, so only 25 have late onset. From where I'm sitting, that's not such a small number. 

...because in the back of my mind, I know my family history is looming. It's an ominous cloud. Always there.

Blaise- a thirty-seven year old male whose father has schizophrenia

So this is what Bobby lived with. What hung over him every day. No wonder he was haunted.

There was another passage below it, one that had been underlined in.

I don't like for people to get close. Whenever they do...it's like waiting every day for the rug to be pulled out from under me. The worst was...I had this girlfriend, lover. I thought she really loved me for who I was. Later I found out she just loved having someone to take care of. She wanted the ego boost. She wanted everyone to feel sorry for her for having to put up with me.

That's all people ever do. Put up with me.

And I don't want tolerating me to be someone's badge of honor.

What I want is someone who cares without being a caretaker.  
Someone who loves without loving attention.  
That woman doesn't exist. Not in the real world. 

I've given up on trying to find someone. I hate being alone, but the most I can hope for from any woman is pity.

Aiden- a forty year old male with unipolar depression

Eames read and reread the underlined passage.

So that's what he thought. _Idiot. If he keeps that up_, she thought,_ I'll _give _him something to pity! _She'd heard people around the station saying that it was amazing that she could put up with him, but not lately: That kind of talk had dropped off. She wondered briefly if he would ever realize that it wasn't the presence of crazy Robert Goren that made the other detectives and clerks nervously back away when they passed. He didn't know about the strong positive correlation between insulting Goren and developing severe pain in the groin.

_And it's his fault I'm thinking like a statistician, too._

No one else would get away with talking about him like that. But she decided, just this once, to let this instance of insulting Bobby go. No point in causing damage to a potential masterpiece, she figured, yawning.

She fell asleep over the page.

xXx

"Up, up!"

"Whanamumph?" Alex managed to utter. She looked at her watch and rolled her eyes. "Do you _sleep _in that suit?" she grumbled.

"Pancakes okay?" Bobby answered.

She squinted at him, still a little hazy, and debated whether she should thank him for cooking breakfast or smack him for waking her up at five a.m.

She decided he was fortunate she hadn't had her coffee yet, as she didn't feel she had the energy to do more than scowl and answer vaguely, "Yeah, 'cakes, whatever. You got any whipp-"

He gestured with the spatula to the Dream WhipTM,R,PG,DVD, RIP, ETC already set out on the table. "You mentioned it once," he explained, shrugging.

Eames shook her feeling of _déjà vu_, trying to force herself awake. _Whipped cream on pancakes, where have I read th_-

"There's some coffee." He pointed to the maker on the counter. "Sugar's on the shelf."

_On the shelf. _ That's when it occurred to her: The book she'd fallen asleep over was back in its place. He'd found her reading it. Great. He was going to get even more hung up on the pity thing now.

What she felt was without a shred of pity. She'd learned from her many impromptu psychology lessons that the technical term was empathy. 

The colloquial word was love.

_In a purely Platonic sense, of course_, she was quick to add, lest the little portion of her brain dedicated to better judgment decided to start lecturing the rest of her.

"Did you sleep okay?" he wondered, setting their plates on the table.

"Um, yeah... I, uh," _How can I be such a good actor with perps and I can't string together a decent, one-word lie when I need one?!_

But he just nodded as she took her seat, either not noticing or simply not commenting. "As comfortable as you can get on that sofa, anyway."

_Okay, so he's not going to mention it. Fine with me._ "You ever figure out what was bugging you about that picture?"

"No," he took a sip of coffee. "Maybe it was nothing."

"It was something. You'll think of it when you're not tryi-" her cell rang. "Eames. Oh, good you're ba- Are you sure? We'll be right in." Bobby put down his fork. So much for breakfast. "Rodgers is back. She says it's murder, no question. She was killed earlier and dumped."

Goren snatched the picture up off the table; squinted at it. "That's it. The blood's been dripped and splattered, not sprayed naturally from her neck. That's what I couldn't..."

Eames nodded, unsurprised. "You know," she gestured with her fork, "If you want to say you figured that out five minutes ago, I'll back you up." She took another bite, then stood, grabbing up her badge, cell, and piece and heading for the door.

**xXx**

I broke one hundred!!!! Thank you so much!!!! Remember that when you review, I write better. And if you didn't get the pancakes joke, leave this ridiculous tripe immediately and go read Fluffy CSI's "Reunion." Go. Move. Now. Did I say go? I think I did.


	15. Various Strangulations

**The Other Side**

**By LMR**

Disclaimer: I stole it. Mine now.

A.N.: And once again, special thanks to Claire for taking time away from her writing to Beta for me. So if "All About Him" doesn't get updated soon enough, you know who to throw tomatoes at. I'll be an easy target, because I'll be glued to my monitor wating for it (no pressure).

**Chapter 15: Various Strangulations**

**xXx**

The Morgue - One Police Plaza - 5:15 a.m. **Doink, doink**.

"I am really glad you're back," Goren admitted to the M.E.

Rodgers smirked. "You didn't try to strangle _my _substitute did you?" She took his scowl as a no. "Too bad. That schmuck."

"So why were you out, anyway?" Eames wondered.

"Well, my ear was hurting, and I tried to ignore it, but it got so bad I couldn't move my head around. Couldn't sleep."

"So what was wrong with it?"

"Well, when I tried to push air out to equalize the pressure, you know, taking my brother's advice to blow it out my ears, it made this squeaking noise. That and the fact that it felt three times its normal size led me to the conclusion that there was an irritable mouse nesting in my ear. Or maybe an infection. Either way, I am sure glad I got in here, because that little... uh, that guy, missed something pretty important," she gestured to the body.

"Well, anyway, it's a complicated process. I can't be like those perfect, obnoxious little examiners on TV, and if I can't, the Boy Wonder sure is going to fall short. Anyway, I found a couple interesting things the little idi-"

"Couple things that went unnoticed?" Goren offered.

"Yeah, sure," Elizabeth said flatly. "First of all, you're right about the handprint: It's hers. But even if she did have AHS, she didn't do _this_," she gestured to the throat. "The pressure's all wrong, deeper bruising in the fingers, not the palm. Someone held her own hand up to her throat, probably while she was unconscious, and used it to make just enough of a bruise to make it look like someone had attacked her before. I'm guessing he didn't want to leave his own handprint, so he used hers to disguise it. Doesn't make much sense, but it's effective, in that we don't have his print, or even the size of his hands. You might be looking for someone with some kind of deformity on the hands, maybe polydacty, or maybe just extra large or small hands. He probably wasn't figuring anyone would think to see if it was hers." Goren just looked at the floor. "She was murdered a few hours later, judging by the coloration of the contusion. To be specific, she kicked it last Monday or Tuesday. Going by tissue damage and the temperature of the kidney, our girl was in the fridge until a couple hours before she was found."

"I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Morris's strange hand didn't put her in the fridge and dump her halfway across town several days later," Eames ventured. Goren looked back at the floor, shuffling his feet.

The M.E. just nodded. "Interesting theory, but I'd recheck your alibis, if I were you. And find out who has access to a fridge big enough for her."

They started walking out the door, then Eames stopped and turned to her partner. "Did you actually try to _strangle _Bishop?"

"Of course not!" he said, sounding insulted. "I wasn't actually, really _trying_," he grumbled. Eames rolled her eyes. _Too bad. That schmuck._

xXx

"Our perp took a lot of trouble to keep the body and move it," Eames pointed out. But it didn't give him or her an alibi. Why bother?"

"They took all that time, there had to be a reason."

"Goren, Eames," Ross called out of his office.

"What now?" Goren wondered.

Eames just sighed. _Speaking of strangling replacements..._

"The mayor wants to know why someone was killed on his doorstep yesterday. What should I tell him?"

"That she wasn't killed there, and she wasn't killed yesterday," Eames said immediately. They explained the new information.

"The freeze doesn't make _sense_!" Goren growled, animated now and pacing. "Why would the killer go to the trouble of freezing the body, not to mention creating a natural-looking bloodspray if not to establish an alibi?"

"Is there a suspect you might have missed?" Ross asked them. "Somebody who _does _have the fake alibi time and not the real one? Just some person who..." he let the sentence trail off, not really knowing what else to say.

"This wasn't a random crime," Eames pointed out. "Too much thought was put into it. It had to have been someone who knew her." 

Goren was shaking his head irritably. "And it's not a crime of passion. Or compulsion. Whoever did this had something - something tangible," he clarified, "To gain from her death."

Eames nodded. "That's not many people," she reminded the Captain. "It's got to be one of them. So why the cold storage?" she brought them back on point.

"So changing the time of death wasn't the reason, it was a practical reason," Goren tried. "Something that would make it easier for the killer."

"Transportation?" Eames offered. "But she never went anywhere near that neighborhood: Why would someone go to all that trouble to dump her there? Maybe somebody making a statement about the government?" she offered, knowing she was grasping at straws.

"It's psychopaths who crave attention, people who kill for gain want to stay low on the radar," Goren countered thoughtfully. "It had to be something about the place. They dumped her there for a reason."

"Too bad they did," Ross grumbled. "Anywhere else this lousy case would have been dumped on the 2-7."

Goren's and Eames's faces lit up with understanding simultaneously.

"What's that look?" Ross wondered, warily.

Eames, ignoring him, raised an eyebrow at Goren. "You think?" 

"Well, he'd have to know it wouldn't be regular police if it happened there."

"So is it about Major Case..."

"Or it could be about the 2-7."

"Maybe one of our suspects knows someone in the 2-7?"

"We have to run their names by the guys at that precinct."

"And start figuring out which suspect knows something about police procedure," Eames added.

_You'll get used to it_, Deakins had told Ross more than a few times. "What are you thinking?"

"That somewhere on the streets of New York is an extremely dumb criminal," Eames told him, already headed out the door.

Ross just sighed. "I'll let him know you've made progress. That sound vague enough?" The detectives nodded and left the office.

Knowing it would be another long day, Goren headed straight for the break room, nodding to Eames that he would bring her some coffee. Passing his desk, Eames noticed his reminder pad. It was a little blue notepad with an overly expressive little caterpillar crawling down the side and a cutsie font that read 'Don't Forget!' at the top. It looked like it was made for a kid. He must have gotten it free from some charity mail-out or something, and didn't want to waste it. Understandable, but still tease-worthy. Her brow creased when she saw what he had written.

Don't Forget!  
Eames really cares.

She could hear the tone in which the words had been thought, knowing that "really" was not an enhancer for "cares," but an attempt to make it real, believable. The words were covered in surprise and incredulity. She could almost see a follow-up line of "Why?" Besides being disheartening, she found it puzzling. How could anyone know him and _not _care?

This needed to change. She grabbed his red pen and scribbled an addendum before scooting back to her seat and doing her best to act as though she hadn't been near his desk at all.

**xXx**

Okay, guys: Whodunnit? You don't care, do you? You just wanna know what she wrote. But if you don't review, I won't tell you.


	16. Whodunnit

**The Other Side**

**by LMR**

Disclaimer: Miss Scarlet stole CI in the study with the wrench.

**Chapter 16: Whodunnit**

Sorry for the shortness. Pivotal information and all that stuff.

A.N.: Thanks as always to Claire for Beta'ing. And Alpha'ing. And Delta'ing. Why Beta, anyway? Anybody get that? Oh, well, thanks guitar74girl.

**xXx**

Eames took a sip of her coffee, recapping for the benefit of the audience. "So the man... or woman, who did this wanted the case to go to a Major Case team?"

"I've heard of an urge to confess, but this is ridiculous," Goren commented. When Eames said nothing, he peeked tentatively up from the spot of floor he'd been staring at.

She could see the questioning look from the corner of her eye. "It was funnier than usual," she said, turning away and purposefully plowing through the bottom file drawer on her desk. "But still not as good as one of mine.

"And stop pouting," she added before setting the paperwork she needed on the desk and finally looking up. He hadn't.

She hesitated, the name hovering in her mind: The only one who would ever set out a case specifically for MCS, Bobby's own personal arch-nemesis. Eames wouldn't let herself even think the name, mostly because the fanfiction writer would puke all over her keyboard if she had to actually type it.

_She's so big on that stupid Moby Dick and the pursuit of evil thing, maybe we should just start calling her 'the great white whale,' _she mused happily. _If there is a shred of decency in whatever benevolent presence is out there writing out our existence, maybe she'll just butter her freakin' parsnips right of the edge of the earth and never show her face again._

But who else would actually _want _Major Case working on their murder?

Finally shaking his annoyance (and his pout) at Eames's assessment of his humor, Goren started thinking out loud. "If it was just about biding his time until he could dump the body, he wouldn't have bothered to do the blood spray. It had to look like it hadn't been stored and dumped. Why?" Goren wondered out loud. "Why Major Case? And why hold on to the body for so long? What was different about Monday morning than the day she was killed?"

She shook her head. "Sheesh, Bobby, brain surgery, rare neurological disorders and hands masquerading as aliens: This case was tailor made for y..." Her eyes lit up and Goren's overactive imagination painted in the light bulb right above her head. (It was a fluorescent bulb. The funny looking twisty kind you put on your porch.) "I can't believe I didn't see it!" she grumbled, pushing up from her chair and heading across the room muttering, leaving a flabbergasted Goren in her wake. "He just took your word for it! We gotta get to Jackson's office," she said, practically kicking herself for not having seen it sooner.

"Who took what? The doctor?" Goren said following and trying not to sound as helpless as he felt.

"And call Daniels' Deli," she instructed a nearby officer. "Tell them we're sending a CSU over for their fridge and they better not touch it." She was halfway out the room, putting her jacket on as she walked. She turned at the door attention back to Goren, who was so close on her heels he nearly plowed into her. "The case came to us because we, well, _you _were the only one who would ever think Persephone's hand did this to her," Goren looked at her quizzically, and finally she stopped walking and turned to him. "Not the doctor: The jerkwad didn't recognize the scuzbag and the ditz, even with our real names." It took him a moment to figure out which insult was referring to which person. The vocabulary one acquires in vice. Or possibly in a family full of brothers. "No idea we were cops. This killer _knows _us. Probably writes down stuff we do... what a weirdo. Someone arranged that body to be found in a high profile place on the first day of Logan and Wheeler's week off. Right to Major Case, and right to us. Arranged it in such a way as to leave everything pointing to Alien Hand Syndrome. Someone who knows about us... someone who knows about your background in psychology, who knows that you really understand all this.

"So he needed someone who could find _those _details," Eames insisted. "What other detective in the world would have-"

"I get it, I get it; it's ridiculous." His hand went instinctively to the back of his neck.

"What other detective," she said insistently. "Would have been clever enough to notice everything that didn't make sense, and find an explanation that _did _make sense?"

Bobby looked stricken. Eames turned away and started walking again. "Yeah, yeah, don't get a swelled head: I still think AHS is the stupidest thing I've ever heard of."

**xXx**

Next week:

"The killer was coming up fast on a busy mall, where he knew he could lose them. He was wearing nondescript clothes and the detectives wouldn't be able to find him in the bustling crowd, so if he could just get a few more steps, he was so close, he was almost there. The detectives were closing in on him, and he slammed his fists, pushing hard against the heavy door."

But who is it? And what did Eames write already!? Guesses?

Please, please review! This means you. Yeah, you. You know who you are.


	17. Getting Their Man

**The Other Side**

**by LMR**

Disclaimer: This disclaimer (the one where LMR says she doesn't own it) has been rated R for Ridiculous and therefore has been censored out of this K+ rated story.

Extra thanks to Claire (guitar73girl) for the excellent Beta. She informs me that I will need some shower gel for all the tomatoes lobbed at me because... well, you'll see.

**Chapter 17: Getting their Man**

**xXx**

"Okay, so Tod Daniels was using his family's deli for cold storage," Eames shuddered. "I am _really _glad you don't like their fries." Judging by the greenish tint on his face, Goren agreed. "After killing Persephone because she found out about his plagiarizing. He must have read about you in the papers, and he would have known about Logan's week off from his talking about it at the deli. So how do we trip this guy up?"

Goren sighed, thinking. "The study habits mixed with his pretension... He needs to feel important. And he has no internal capacity for that: He's insecure. He needs it reinforced by the people around him."

Eames nodded. _He's a windbag,_ she mentally amended. "We play with his ego - make him prove that he knows more than we think he does." She thought for a moment, picked up the phone. "We need to get as much information as we can on what Persephone's condition really was." Goren nodded and as she headed back for their desks and regretfully dialed Dr. Nahme, knowing they would never be able to report either doctor.

xXx

Office of Dr. Jason Jackson and Dr. D. Kwak, M.D.'s - 7:32 a.m. **Doink, doink**.

The detectives made their way across the overgrown planters to the desk at the back of the office. "I _told _you he would already be here," Goren intoned, annoyed.

"Yeah, okay, fine you were right," Eames said defensively. "But we need to talk to the doctor, not a go-between," she insisted, completely ignoring Tod.

"I can take a message for him." There was a distinct note of dryness in his voice, telling Eames that Goren's profile was spot-on.

"Yes, thank you. Turns out we were way off. It was a..." she looked at Goren tentatively, as if unwilling to give out any details. "It was a suicide," she finished. "Give Dr. Jackson our apologies." Under her breath she added, "Give his wife our apologies, too."

"_Eames_," Goren said in his best warning tone.

"Well, it's true," she hissed in a frustrated voice. "He cheats, he's so incompetent he didn't even notice that she had A-" she cut herself short, glancing nervously at Tod, composed herself and lowered her voice. "She shouldn't have been unmonitored with that... um..."

He tapped her arm lightly. "Can we talk about this someplace else? I really don't think..."

She dragged him aside "out of earshot" of Tod, behind an obscenely large rubber plant, and started up with her best stage whisper. "It's not like he knows what we're talking about. You've seen how he studies; He doesn't know squat about _depression_ even, no way he would know about split-brain surge-"

"Shh," Goren hissed back. "Of course he doesn't know, but that doesn't mean we can just go blabbing about it with just anybody who's standing around. Women and their big mouths," he added, getting a look._ Very funny ad-lib, Goren_.

Even Eames's glare managed to sound sarcastic.

"I don't know what you're getting so uptight about, Goren - the doctor's going to know all about what happened, he's bound to tell Tad."

Goren frowned in thought. "For one thing, Eames, that's still very unprofessional. And for another," he glanced back and made his voice sound lower while not actually talking any quieter. "I get the distinct impression Jackson doesn't tell Tom much of anything. I wouldn't," he grumbled.

"Can I help you with something, Detectives?" Tod asked sourly.

"No, we don't need any help from you," Eames said casually, her voice not sharing the callous edge of her words.

"Waitwaitwait," Goren said, squishing it all into one word. "Maybe he _could _help us." Eames rolled her eyes. "Well, Eames, we need to be absolutely sure before we close this case. Maybe..." He turned to Tod swiftly, walking toward him. "Did Persephone ever show any odd behavior? Did she have any ticks?"

"Now who's talking too much? Jerk," Eames grumbled. She raised an eyebrow at him. _So there._

"Um, well," here Tod jumped as if he'd had a burst of inspiration. "Yeah! She, well, her hand sometimes kind of, well it jittered, sort of."

"Jittered?" Eames wondered, incredulous.

"And once, I saw her left hand try to kind of, scratch her up a little, like it was trying to hurt her."

_Bingo. _ Dr. Nahme and Dr. Jackson had both confirmed that Persephone had clearly told them that her hand had never become violent. "Can you describe the jittering and the scratching?" _Can you dig yourself into a nice little hole, please?_

"Sometimes," he started tentatively. "It would kind of move around, and she would have a hard time stopping it. It was like it didn't like her."

Eames, frustrated, turned to Goren and disdainfully away from Tod, lowering her voice. "He doesn't know this stuff! He's not going to know anything about A-"

"It was almost like she had Alien Hand Syndrome," Daniels broke in, a note of desperation. The detectives both allowed a brief flicker of surprise and recognition.

"We... um, didn't expect you to know anything about that," Goren admitted.

"When the corpus callosum is severed, sometimes the two hemispheres don't exactly... cooperate the way they should. The left side goes a little haywire and starts to hurt the person." He continued knowledgeably. "I know I saw something like that in Persephone. I talked to her about it."

"Really. You'd think," Eames started. "That she would talk about something like that with her doctors, not her... um, well, the secretary." Daniels visibly seethed. 'You know, it's funny, though.

"We talked to both her doctors, and they said she showed no signs whatsoever of having violent Alien Hand Syndrome," Goren pointed out.

"So why exactly would you want so much for us to think she had it?"

Their sudden change in behavior told Tod that these detectives knew everything.

He shot up from the chair and started to run.

Goren and Eames just rolled their eyes. Good as a signed confession, but annoying as hell. They raced after him.

xXx

Tod was coming up fast on a busy mall, where he knew he could lose them. He was wearing nondescript clothes and the detectives wouldn't be able to find him in the bustling crowd, so if he could just get a few more steps, he was so close, he was almost there. The detectives were closing in on him, and Tod slammed his fists, pushing hard against the heavy door.

It didn't budge.

He paused thoughtfully a moment, looking at the sticker above the handle.

_Pull_.

Oh.

"All right, that's enough." Eames slammed him against the door, frisking him, nudging his legs apart so Goren could check for an ankle holster. "Tod Daniels, you are under arrest for the murder of Persephone Morris. You have the right to remain silent..." She pushed him gently into the waiting squad car, squeezing his head a little harder than needed as payback for their impromptu jog. The officer in the passenger seat continued the litany.

Once left to themselves, Goren noticed that Eames's expression was a scowl bordering dangerously on a pout. "We may not need to do all the jazz, but we'll still get to interrogate him a little," he said, encouragingly.

"Oh, you're just trying to make me feel better." _Thanks._

**xXx**

Next week:

"Red pen in Eames's handwriting. He felt his face grow hot with embarrassment for a moment, until he read what it said..."

Yeah, I'm cruel. You have to wait one more week. Last call for guesses...


	18. The Profound, Sad yet Somewhat Sappy End

**The Other Side**

**by LMR**

A.N.: Thank you for all the guesses, I _loved _reading them. I did get one guess for the killer (thanks, Kate!) and about 200 for Eames's message. I'm glad to know you have your priorites sorted out, and I'm not being sarcastic. We know what's most important. My compliments to Z. E. Grockle and the lovely guitar73girl (my own lovely Beta, Claire), who are oh so good at guessing games!

A.N. 2: And another big thank you to guitar7_**3**_girl, Claire for so kindly beta'ing my stories dispite the fact that I have consistantly written her name wrong. Sorry, dear.

Disclaimer: If I owned the show (which I don't), it would end with touching character moments instead of ...

**Chapter 18: The Profound, Sad, and Somewhat Sappy Ending Statement About the Loss of the Victim, etc.**

**xXx**

Watching Tod get taken to his cell, the detectives, Carver, and Ross paused a moment wondering how money or school records could ever be considered more important than a human life. "There's some good news," Carver informed them. "Cece gave up the blinders. She reported her husband's indiscretions. Faced with losing his license, Jackson rolled on Nahme. They're both facing some serious repercussions."

Eames nodded, still watching Tod. "The price was just too high for him," she remarked.

"It was Persephone who paid the highest price," Goren pointed out. Eames nodded in agreement. 

(Go to black screen, EXECUTIVE PRODUCER DICK WOLF)

_Hey, I'm not done yet!!! _I'm _not ending it with the stupid little sad observation about the victim just because the show does!__ Get back here!_

After Carver and Ross had left the room, the detectives headed back to their double desks. And that was when Bobby noticed his reminder pad. His note had been changed and added onto in red pen.

Red pen in Eames's handwriting. He felt his face grow hot with embarrassment for a moment, until he read what it said:

Don't Forget!

Eames really cares.

No, duh, Sherlock.

And scrawled at the bottom: "And what's with the caterpillar, ya big geek?"

Tempering the gravity of those kind and important words with an insult. _Clever Eames_.

Fortunately for Bobby, she wasn't paying attention to him right now. She had chosen the moment before he looked down at the reminder to go digging through her desk for something. That was lucky. He was rattled and really didn't want her to see him right now.

_No, Bobby, I don't see you grinning like an idiot_. 

**xXx**

Please, please review!

Coming soon:

(What do you mean there's a _sequel_, you depraved woman?!)

**Electricity**

"'There's a phone number, no name with it." Goren held the business card delicately in his fingers, looking at the back. "And it could have something to do with why he was killed. ... It's our phone number.'"

But you don't care about that part, do you? (I wouldn't.) You want the cheesy romantic subplot. Well, here goes...

"_Stupid caterpillar. _

Stupid caterpillar with no note above it. No profession of how much she cared. No joke about his precious geekiness. No nothing. She couldn't believe it.

Bobby had thrown it out."


End file.
